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April 2024

John Tierney The WHO’s Power Grab The last thing we need: a new and unaccountable global pandemic czar

https://www.city-journal.org/article/the-whos-power-grab

The response to Covid was the greatest mistake in the history of the public-health profession, but the officials responsible for it are determined to do even worse. With the support of the Biden administration, the World Health Organization (WHO) is seeking unprecedented powers to impose its policies on the United States and the rest of the world during the next pandemic.

It was bad enough that America and other countries voluntarily followed WHO bureaucrats’ disastrous pandemic advice instead of heeding the scientists who had presciently warned, long before 2020, that lockdowns, school closures, and mandates for masks and vaccines would be futile, destructive, and unethical. It was bad enough that U.S. officials and the corporate media parroted the WHO’s false claims and ludicrous praise of China’s response. But now the WHO wants new authority to make its bureaucrats’ whims mandatory—and to censor those who disagree with their version of “the science.” 

The WHO hopes to begin this power grab in May at its annual assembly in Geneva, where members will vote on proposed changes in international health regulations and a new treaty governing pandemics. Pamela Hamamoto, the State Department official representing the U.S. in negotiations, has already declared that America is committed to signing a pandemic treaty that will “build a stronger global health architecture,” which is precisely what we don’t need. 

If we learned anything from the pandemic, it was the folly of entrusting narrow-minded public-health officials with wide-ranging powers. The countries that fared best, like Sweden, were the ones that ignored the advice of the WHO, and the U.S. states that fared best, like Florida, were the ones that defied the White House Coronavirus Task Force and the Centers for Disease Control. This wasn’t a new lesson. Previous research had shown that giving national leaders new powers to respond to a natural disaster typically leads to more fatalities and economic damage.

The Iranians Pay a Price in Syria Israel targets the generals orchestrating Tehran’s terror war.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/israel-strike-syria-iran-mohammad-reza-zahedi-islamic-revolutionary-guard-corps-biden-administration-78778704?mod=opinion_lead_pos2

Iran paid the first real price Monday for its proxy warfare in the Middle East after Israel killed the leading Iranians sowing chaos in the region. “The most significant assassination since Soleimani” is how the missile strike in Damascus is being reported in Israel. That’s a reference to the January 2020 U.S. strike on Qassem Soleimani, the longtime mastermind of Iran’s foreign terrorism and proxy-war strategy.

Monday’s strike killed Gen. Mohammad Reza Zahedi, Iran’s top Quds Force commander in Lebanon and Syria, as well as his deputy commander and his chief of general staff. Israel doesn’t claim responsibility for such attacks, but its Army Radio and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps have confirmed the kills. The IRGC announced seven dead members.

As regional chief of the Quds Force, Zahedi was point man in Iran’s war on Israel. He was the boss of Hezbollah, the Iranian proxy that has fired more than 3,500 rockets, unprovoked, on Israel’s north since Oct. 7, and he gave orders to Syria’s Assad regime as well. Zahedi was responsible for Iran’s weapons transfers to Hezbollah and was believed to be in daily contact with its leader, Hassan Nasrallah.

The attack was carried out with precision on a building next to Iran’s embassy that reportedly served as the IRGC military headquarters. Much hemming and hawing will turn on whether this building was a diplomatic or military site. The IRGC and its Quds Force are U.S.-designated terrorist organizations that plot and execute Iran’s strategy of regional subversion and expansion. These are men with rivers of blood on their hands.

Political Stability Requires a Secure Border Leaders who invite chaos also give voters a reason to support illiberal alternatives Walter Russell Mead

https://www.wsj.com/articles/political-stability-requires-a-secure-border-chaos-invites-illiberal-policies-4b09f74b?mod=opinion_lead_pos9

As the 2024 presidential campaign heats up, American attitudes toward migrants and migration are turning more negative. A March 2024 Gallup survey found that immigration was the issue voters most frequently mentioned spontaneously as the top problem facing the country. An Associated Press-NORC poll conducted last month found that 64% of respondents supported hiring more Border Patrol agents, 53% wanted to reduce the number of asylum applicants, and 42% wanted a wall.

The U.S. isn’t the only place where border security is a hot political issue. The Dominican Republic is building a 250-mile wall across the island of Hispaniola to seal off its border with Haiti. Migrants crossing the English Channel have become a political challenge for Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s beleaguered Conservatives in Britain. From Sweden to Spain, far-right anti-immigrant parties appear poised to make big gains in June’s elections to the European Parliament.

Since 1970, when only 4.7% of the U.S. population was born outside the country, the percentage of foreign-born residents has grown. In 2022 the Census Bureau estimated that 13.9% of the population is foreign-born, and that share continues to rise. The last time the foreign-born percentage reached comparable levels, Congress ultimately passed the 1924 Johnson-Reed Act and immigration from the Eastern Hemisphere plunged by more than 90%.