Sweden: Hijab is ‘Look of the Year’ by Judith Bergman

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15509/sweden-hijab

Hejazipour said that she had decided not to have a share in this horrendous lie and not to play the game of ‘We love the hijab and have no problem with it’ anymore… It creates many limitations for women and deprives them of their basic rights. Is this protection? I say definitely not, it is solely and merely a limitation.”

“The Iranian authorities are employing the full machinery of the state to crush opposition to forced hijab, but with more than half the population against it, the tide is increasingly against them.” — Hadi Ghaemi, Executive Director, Center for Human Rights in Iran, August 19, 2019

Swedish Elle readers are obviously free to choose whomever they see fit to be “look of the year”. It is, however, perplexing that female readers in a self-proclaimed feminist nation who wears the hijab, when a study commissioned by Swedish authorities has shown that wearing a hijab for many women and children in Sweden is far from being a voluntary choice.

“Those of us who have fled gender apartheid dictatorships, where women risk their lives to protest the veil, know and have experienced what chastity laws mean… our feminist government chooses to prioritize collective religious rights over the human rights of children and women… As long as trendsetting journalists see gender apartheid as ‘culture’ …. oppression based on honor will continue”. — Maria Rashidi and Sara Mohammad, human rights activists, Dagens Samhälle, December 14, 2019.

On February 1, World Hijab Day will be marked in countries all over the world, including in Sweden. Will anyone use that occasion to stand up for the many women and children who do not want to wear one?

On January 20, Iran’s only female Olympic medalist, Kimia Alizadeh, defected from Iran. “I am one of the millions of oppressed women in Iran whom they’ve been playing for years,” she wrote.

Then, last month, the Islamic Republic’s female chess master, Mitra Hejazipour, 27, removed her hijab during a chess tournament in Moscow and was promptly removed from the national chess team.

Elizabeth Warren Vows to Let a ‘Young Trans Person’ Choose Her Education Secretary (!!!???) Eric Lendrum

https://amgreatness.com/2020/01/31/elizabeth-warren-vows-to-let-a-young-trans-person-choose-her-education-secretary/

Presidential candidate and Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) declared at a recent campaign event in Iowa that if she became president, she would let a transgender student select her Secretary of Education, as Breitbart reports.

Warren said that she had only two qualifications for a potential Education Secretary, with one being that they must have “taught in a public school,” and the other being that a “young trans person interview [them] on my behalf, and only if this person believes” in that candidate would Warren select them. The bizarre statement was in response to a questioner who demanded that LGBTQ history be taught more widely in public schools.

It is the latest example of Warren’s pandering to the “transgender” population, which comprises less than one percent of the American population, and consists of mentally ill individuals who believe that they are a different gender than the one they are biologically born with. Last year, Warren vowed that as president, she would read the names of every transgender person who died in America ever year in a Rose Garden ceremony.

Warren is currently polling in either third or fourth place in the upcoming Iowa caucuses, behind Senator Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.), former Vice President Joe Biden, and South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg (D-Ind.).

As Impeachment Ends, It’s Time to Correct These Nine Injustices Adam Mill *****

https://amgreatness.com/2020/02/01/as-impeachment-ends-its-time-to-correct-these-nine-injustices/

The president should take action to exploit this very short window in which his exhausted opponents cast about for their next fake “bombshell.” They’re going to complain about Trump anyway. He might as well give them something to complain about.

How will Donald Trump spend the windfall of political space resulting from the busted impeachment effort? It now appears that the Senate is ready to put an end to Rep. Adam Schiff’s (D-Calif.) vanity project. The “resistance” will require approximately six weeks to lick its wounds and re-manufacture outrage over yet another Trump “scandal.”

In the meanwhile, an exhausted Congress and media cannot easily pivot to another offensive. The president should use this critical breathing space immediately to correct some of the many outrages perpetrated by his opponents. Yes, as a matter of fact, I do have a wish list.

Communists Honor Fake News Champion CNN Humberto Fontova

https://townhall.com/columnists/humbertofontova/2020/02/01/communists-honor-fake-news-champion-cnn-n2560496

“Cuba is “prepared” for the possibility of Donald Trump’s reelection and the continuation of crushing US sanctions against the island, according to Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel….The Cuban president’s challenge to the Trump administration came during a tour of central Cuba last week, where CNN was given rare access to the Cuban head of state…CNN was one of three international outlets invited to accompany Diaz-Canel on parts of his trip.” (CNN, Havana, Jan. 29.)

Gosh!  I wonder why a “journalist” for the “press agency” CNN should be honored in such a manner by a totalitarian Stalinist regime that has jailed, tortured and exiled the most (genuine) journalists in the history of the Western Hemisphere? 

Perhaps a (genuine) journalist named Vicente Botin can provide a clue: 

“The Castro regime assigns 20 security agents to follow and monitor every foreign journalist. You play the regime’s game and practice self–censorship or you’re gone.” (Vicente Botin, reporter for Madrid’s El Pais who was promptly booted from Cuba for refusing to play the same sniveling, cowardly game as CNN’s “reporters” play every time they file a “story” from Cuba.)

Wokeness run amok By Chris Talgo

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/02/wokeness_run_amok.html

For the past few weeks, the coronavirus has caused turmoil and panic across the globe. Although the virus originated in China, cases have been reported in several countries, including the United States.

To address the problem, President Trump, who is in charge of protecting the homeland, did something almost any president would do in the midst of a possible outbreak: He created a task force, aptly named the President’s Coronavirus Task Force.

On January 29, the White House released the following statement: “Today, President Donald J. Trump announced the formation of the President’s Coronavirus Task Force. Members of the Task Force have been meeting on a daily basis since Monday.” Sounds good so far.

The statement continued, “The Task Force is led by Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar… It is composed of subject matter experts from the White House and several United States Government agencies, and it includes some of the Nation’s foremost experts on infectious diseases.” No major problem here.

The press release also noted that, “The President’s top priority is the health and welfare of the American people… The Administration, led by the President’s Task Force, will continue to work to prevent the spread of the new coronavirus.” Seems like common sense.

Republicans defeat Democratic bid to hear witnesses in Trump trial The vote represented a major victory for McConnell and Trump.

The Senate on Friday night narrowly rejected a motion to call new witnesses in Donald Trump’s impeachment trial, paving the way for a final vote to acquit the president by next week.

In a 51-49 vote, the Senate defeated a push by Democrats to depose former national security adviser John Bolton and other witnesses on their knowledge of the Ukraine scandal that led to Trump’s impeachment.

Two Republicans — Susan Collins of Maine and Mitt Romney of Utah — joined all 47 Senate Democrats in voting for the motion. Two potential GOP swing votes, Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, stuck with their party, ensuring Democrats were defeated.

Notable & Quotable: Max Singer on ax Singer R.I.P.-Truth and Mideast Peace ‘Parroting Palestinian falsehoods harms the cause of peace.’

https://www.wsj.com/articles/notable-quotable-max-singer-on-truth-and-mideast-peace-11580513960?mod=opinion_lead_pos11

From “Refute Palestinian Lies to Promote Mideast Peace” by Max Singer, a founder of the Hudson Institute, The Wall Street Journal, Dec. 7, 2018. Singer died Jan. 23 at 88:

The U.S. has already acted to gain recognition of three key truths that had long been diplomatically ignored: Jerusalem is the capital of Israel; very few of the Palestinians that the U.N. Relief and Works Agency supports are actually refugees; and the U.N. has been unacceptably biased against Israel.

Now the U.S. can tip the political balance toward peace and stability by insisting on two other truths. First, despite widespread use of the term in diplomatic documents and debate, there is no such thing as “occupied Palestinian territory” because there has never been a Palestinian territory to occupy. As some Palestinians point out, they have never had a state of their own. This is far more than a game of semantics. If the land was Palestinian, then Israel could have stolen it. If the land isn’t Palestinian, then Israel couldn’t have stolen it. It’s critical that the U.S. actively combat the falsehood that Israel exists on stolen Palestinian land.

The second falsehood is married to the first. The Palestinians not only claim that all the land is theirs, they also deny any Jewish connection to it. During the failed Camp David talks in 2000, Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat stunned President Clinton by asserting the Jews had no connection to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, the place where the first and second Jewish temples stood.

Andrew McCarthy: In Trump impeachment trial, Senate right to block new witness testimony By Andrew McCarthy

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/andrew-mccarthy-in-trump-impeachment-trial-senate-right-to-block-new-witness-testimony

The Senate was right to vote Friday against hearing new witness testimony at President Trump’s impeachment trial. The Democrats’ demand for new witnesses at the trial was a red herring – a talking point that had some surface appeal but, upon scrutiny, was nonsense.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., and the other impeachment managers claim that there have been no witnesses in the trial. They said before the Senate voted 51-49 Friday to block more witnesses that if Republicans did note vote to approve subpoenas for former National Security Adviser John Bolton, among other top current and former administration officials, that the trial will be a “sham” – an exercise in “cover-up.” You can’t have a real trial, was their refrain, unless witnesses are called.

It is nonsense. There have been plenty of witnesses. Schiff’s problem is that the additional witnesses he wanted to call would not change what has already been proved in any meaningful way.

Obviously, what’s happening in the Senate is not a trial in any familiar sense. We are used to judicial trials. Impeachment presents something completely different, a Senate trial. The Senate is a political body, not a law court.

New Bolton Book Allegations Drop Hours ahead of Vote on Witnesses By Zachary Evans

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/new-bolton-book-allegations-drop-hours-ahead-of-vote-on-witnesses/

New reports of the contents of former White House adviser John Bolton’s book have surfaced hours before the Senate is scheduled to vote on whether to call witnesses in the impeachment trial of President Trump.

According to the New York Times, Bolton writes in his forthcoming book that Trump directed him to assist in the pressure campaign to coerce Ukrainian officials to conduct investigations against Joe and Hunter Biden during a May meeting at which the president’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani, acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, and White House counsel Pat Cipillone were present.

During the meeting, Trump directed Bolton to set up a meeting between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Giuliani, who was then planning a trip to Ukraine to discuss the opening of the Biden investigation with government officials. Giuliani on Friday denied he was present at such a meeting, while Trump said Bolton’s alleged account was wrong.

The Times’ Sunday report on Bolton’s book, The Room Where it Happened, disrupted Republicans’ blanket opposition to calling witnesses in the impeachment trial. After unanimously resisting Democrats’ calls for Bolton to testify, moderate Republicans began to waver on Monday.

More Selective Editing of American History By John Yoo

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/more-selective-editing-of-american-history/

Today, the president of the University of California, Janet Napolitano, decided to remove the name of John Boalt from the law school building at the University of California at Berkeley. Boalt undeniably made racist remarks opposing Chinese immigration to California in the late 19th century which added to the forces that results in the passage of the infamous Chinese Exclusion Act.

I have taught at Berkeley Law (as we are supposed to call it, rather than Boalt Hall, as it was known for decades) for 27 years (unbelievably to both conservatives and liberals). I think that Boalt was flat wrong in his views and that the nation erred in its policies on immigration during this time. If I had my way, we would increase legal immigration even now by a factor of 2x and 3x, rather than considering its restriction.

 

But I am saddened to see my great university following the herd of other colleges that are selectively editing American history. The answer to the sad moments of the past is not to remove people and events from our collective memory, but to remember them and learn from them. Shall we next re-sculpt Mount Rushmore because Washington and Jefferson owned slaves and Roosevelt liked war, and remove the Washington and Jefferson monuments from the National Mall? Closer to home, shall we end the Jefferson lectures at Berkeley for the same reasons? Shall we edit out the names of chancellors and university leaders who worked on the nuclear bomb because the politically sensitive on campuses today reject that WWII ended with Hiroshima and Nagasaki?