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Deadly Threat from Iran Former IRGC commander threatens to nuke Israel – and why he’s for real. Kenneth R. Timmerman

Posted By on February 26th, 2018

Maj. General Mohsen Rezai founded Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps in the early days of the revolution, upon the personal orders of Ayatollah Khomeini.

While he relinquished control of the IRGC in 1997, he remains one of the regime’s most influential leaders. A “principalist,” who is considered a revolutionary purist, Rezai has occasionally shown a more pragmatic bent.

He regularly boasts of the Iranian regime’s military power, and issues threats to all who would challenge the regime that seem to get dismissed in the Western media.

Last week, when he vowed to “level Tel Aviv to the ground,” was no exception.

He was speaking in response to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who warned at the Munich Security Conference last week that Israel would “act against Iran itself” if Iran continued to invade Israeli air space, as they did when they sent a drone into Israel from an air base in Syria.

And yet, outside of the Israeli media, only the Daily Mail paid much attention to Rezai’s threats.

But make no mistake about it: General Rezai understands the cold calculus of nuclear deterrence, and he was not making an idle threat.

His message was crystal clear: Iran considers itself to be a nuclear weapons-capable state. And he speaks from direct, personal knowledge since he was himself in charge of Iran’s nuclear weapons program for over a decade.

I know this because his son defected to the United States at the age of 23 in 1999, and wound up staying with me for several months, learning English in my basement by watching Jackie Chan movies. Many of the stories he told me about his father I related in a 2005 book, Countdown to Crisis: the Coming Nuclear Showdown with Iran.

Here is just one of them, which explains why I am confident that General Rezai was not making an idle threat to Israel last week. It involves a January 1993 trip Rezai made to China and North Korea with a 50-man military delegation, as well as his then teenage son.

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How Identity Politics Is Made to Destroy Us By David Horowitz

Posted By on February 26th, 2018

In January, when negotiations over the fate of 800,000 DACA recipients broke down, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) blamed the impasse on the alleged racism of President Trump and his senior advisers.

“Last night the president put forth a plan,” Pelosi told the U.S. Conference of Mayors. “Let me just say what I said last night, that plan is a campaign to make America white again.” This was not only an obvious lie, but a spectacularly brazen one, since Trump’s announced plan would provide a path to citizenship not only for the illegal aliens who had benefited from President Obama’s constitutionally suspect Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, all of whom are nonwhite, but for a million additional illegals, mainly from Latin America, who are also mainly nonwhite.

Trump’s general immigration plan seeks to move to a merit-based system, which would give priority to immigrants who can contribute needed skills to the country and would have a reasonable chance of success once they arrived. Giving priority to English speakers would enhance the ability of new arrivals to assimilate and succeed. To oppose such a plan on the grounds Pelosi does, one would have to believe that nonwhite immigrants don’t have skills or don’t speak English. Anti-Trump reporter Jim Acosta made the latter insinuation on CNN. He said Trump wanted only immigrants from majority-white countries like “England and Australia.” In fact, English is the official language in more than 57 countries, including such nonwhite countries as Zimbabwe, Uganda, and Botswana, as well as Caribbean nations like Jamaica and Guyana.

Pelosi’s malicious accusation was even more disconnected from reality, since Trump has never proposed excluding or expelling populations based on race, which would be the only way to “make America white again” (whatever that might mean). Yet this denial of obvious facts in order to gin up a racial indictment of what otherwise would be seen as patriotic policies has become the ever-present theme of the Democrats’ attacks on Trump’s presidency. These attacks began with his first statement on immigration during the opening presidential primary debate. At that time, speaking specifically of people crossing the border illegally, Trump said, “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best . . . . They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with [them]. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”

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The Labyrinth of Oppressions By Victor Davis Hanson

Posted By on February 26th, 2018

When the human experience is simplistically divided into two worlds, then things increasingly do not easily fit.

Specifically, what happens when the number of victims begins to outnumber the pool of oppressors? At that point can the oppressed become victims of the oppressed?

The following news stories illustrate the increasingly incoherent world of the aggrieved and their aggressors:

Item: Nancy Pelosi is on a tour to blast the new tax reform and reduction law, whose savings often will result in $1,000 or more per annum to families. The law already had encouraged private enterprise bonuses to employees due to employer savings. Pelosi habitually scoffs that such savings are “crumbs.” At a recent speech, after she intoned that income inequality would be exacerbated, a woman in the audience shouted out, “How much are you worth, Nancy?”

Fair question. She and her husband, a developer and property investor (with apparently good connections within the bureaucracy of federal construction, land sales, and property acquisitions) are worth over $100 million. They own more than one multimillion-dollar home. And soon the Pelosis are likely to pay tens of thousands of dollars more in California property and income taxes that are no longer fully deductible under the new law that she so energetically despises.

Could that banal fact explain why Pelosi is so heated about a reform that gives the middle class more take-home pay, and will create more jobs and bonuses from the private sector—partly at the expense of blue-state, high-income professionals like herself?

From this teachable moment, we could conclude that progressivism is so often promoted by the very rich. They are best positioned to game the system and seek exemption through virtue-signaling about the poor. The Pelosis of our postmodern world assume that they are not to be subject to the ramification of their ideologies (she dismissed the rude questioning without answering). And they so often exhibit a peculiar contempt for the working middle classes. The latter are clueless, in need of guidance, and supposedly deluded by the promise of “crumbs”—given their lack of education and sophistication, and the absence of the romance accorded to the distant poor. How did we ever get to a point where a progressive politician on the barricades, worth $100 million, lectures the middle class that their extra $200-300 a month are crumbs?

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Peter Smith: The Strange Logic of Gun ‘Control’

Posted By on February 26th, 2018

Whenever a lunatic perpetrates a mass shooting the calls for additional gun control are immediate and the consequences predictable: more restrictions on law-abiding owners, who don’t need them, while homicidal types ignore and defy the law as they always do and will.

One week after the Florida high school killings CNN hosted a “stacked” Town Hall meeting. This is Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel, at the meeting, berating Dana Loesch a spokeswoman for the NRA. “You just told this group of people that you are standing up for them. You’re not standing up for them, until you say I want less weapons.” Interruption follows for cheering and loud applause.

Proverbs 26:11 comes to mind: “As a dog returns to his vomit. So a fool [the typical bleeding-heart Democrat in this case] repeats his folly.” Luckily and fortunately, Americans have President Trump, who I will come to.

What the Sheriff didn’t say, because it hadn’t yet leaked out, was that one of his deputies, Scot Peterson, who served as the ‘armed resource officer’, had remained sheltered from harm outside of the school while the shooting was going on. Another three of his deputies who arrived on the scene stayed crouched behind their police vehicle. Peterson was suspended and has since resigned.

Sheriff Israel was also at pains to deflect attention from the FBI’s failure to follow up specific warnings passed on them and his own department’s failure to do anything about Nikolas Cruz despite receiving many complaints. Only one person was to blame he intoned. Really? Then what is the point of him and his fainthearted deputies?

One message from this episode, as if we didn’t know, is that the police cannot be relied upon to protect us or our families.

I was once attacked by a no-good, estranged boyfriend of one of my daughters outside of my house. I tried ineptly, as best as I could, to fight him off and was lucky that an ex-truck driver neighbor intervened to help me out. In the meantime, my wife at the time had called the police. They arrived too late for the main event. He had long since run off threatening to set a gang on me.

For a while I carried a tightly rolled-up newspaper in my briefcase to ward off potential attackers. I don’t exactly recall, but I might have seen this used effectively by James Bond. How effective it would have been in my hands I will leave you to guess.

Most of us are protected because of where we live and the people we mix with. There is another, less safe world on our doorsteps but, to a large extent, the two worlds do not intersect. Watch out if and when they do. Then you will have no protection worth spit.

America is a gun-owning society, as is Switzerland. According to the latest UNODC figures, the homicide rate in America is over seven times that in Switzerland. And, as point of interest, five times that in non-gun-owning Australia. America is a more dangerous place to live – particularly in some places, in some cities. Would you like to have a gun to protect yourself and your family? Or, are you content to rely on the police arriving in the nick of time?

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Dimwit Florida Sheriff Was ‘Once a Proud Member of Team Obama’ By Jack Dunphy

Posted By on February 26th, 2018

When some major police incident occurs, it is most often my practice to withhold comment until I can be sure that most of the facts surrounding it have been revealed. A horrific event like a school shooting like that which occurred in Parkland, Fla., arouses the impulse to weigh in with opinions based on incomplete or even false information. It is best to resist this impulse.

Others, of course, with endless hours of air time to fill, and with agendas to push along, are unable to resist it. There may be more egregious examples of this, but I don’t see how anyone can compete with the CNN’s recent “town hall,” at which Sen. Marco Rubio and Dana Loesch were mocked and browbeaten by what amounted to little more than an angry mob.

Which is not to say the people in attendance didn’t have reason to be angry. The crowd was made up of students, parents, and teachers from Stoneman Douglas High School, where days earlier 31 students and staff members had been shot, 17 of them fatally. From a high school student’s limited perspective and experience, he knows only that something horrific has occurred in his world, something that by all rights should not have. With his nerves still raw and exposed, he sees before him on the stage a conservative senator and a spokesperson for the National Rifle Association, each of whom he perceives, in that limited perspective and experience, to have contributed to the trauma he has experienced.

Fine. One expects as much from young people, but with the understanding that their outrage, however well founded, will have limited influence in the formulation of public policy. What I found most interesting in the CNN broadcast, aside from the graciousness shown by Sen. Rubio and Ms. Loesch, was how Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel came to be a crowd favorite, echoing as he did their loudly expressed passion for stricter gun control, all the while eliding the apparent failures of his own department. Interrupting Ms. Loesch at one point, Sheriff Israel said to her, “You just told this group of people that you are standing up for them. You’re not standing up for them until you say, ‘I want less weapons.’” This statement, though meaningless, was of course intended to be an applause line, and indeed it was greeted with a standing ovation. CONTINUE AT SITE

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Rick Harrison of ‘Pawn Stars’: ‘Kill the Liberals with Logic’ By Nicholas Ballasy

Posted By on February 26th, 2018

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. – Reality television personality Rick Harrison of the History Channel’s “Pawn Stars” lamented that too many high school and college students in America believe “capitalism is bad” and that the federal government can afford to “pay for everything.”

“Kids come out of high school today, they think corporations are bad. They think capitalism is bad. The No. 1 thing in the world that has brought people out of poverty is capitalism,” Harrison said at the Conservative Political Action Conference outside D.C. on Friday.

“We have a generation of young people who think the government can just pay for everything and they have no understanding of how government works and … who we are, why we are and why this country has become such a great country,” he added. “You have kids in college who really think this is a bad country – trust me, I’ve been to India, this is a great country.”

Harrison, co-owner of the World Famous Gold & Silver Pawn Shop in Las Vegas, told the audience that he would not have been able to overcome his battle with childhood epilepsy and succeed in any other country.

“I had to drop out of high school because I was so sick and I became very, very wealthy because I tried really hard. I failed a lot of times, but eventually I got it. There’s no other country in the world, I believe, I could have done that in. So this is a great country,” he said. “When they are argue that this country is terrible, ask them: What country do you think is so great then? Because you’re never going to be able to find a country like this. I don’t know how else to put it.”

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Where in the World is Mahmoud Abbas? Being Treated in a Great Satan Hospital By Ethel C. Fenig

Posted By on February 26th, 2018

After damning the United States for recognizing reality by stating that since Jerusalem is the capital of Israel the US will move its Embassy there in May to celebrate Israel’s 70th anniversary, the PLO president-for-life, Mahmoud (a variation of the name Mohammed) Abbas took his traveling hate show to a receptive audience, the UN, where he repeated the message but in more moderate — relatively — terms.

And then? Well, since he condemns the US and all that it symbolizes whenever the opportunity arises — and even when it doesn’t…

“Damn your money!” to the United States following President Trump’s decision on Jerusalem. “We will not accept for the U.S. to be a mediator, because after what they have done to us — a believer shall not be stung twice in the same place.”

…he quickly returned to the well…”s&#*hole” territory he presides over. where US aid money, which he still eagerly accepts, European aid money, oil aid money from Muslim countries, and UNRWA aid money is used for weapons and destruction, not schools and hospitals. Except that he didn’t return there, according to the Jewish Insider, almost the only outlet on the story:

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was sighted on Wednesday in Baltimore, Maryland. According to a source, Abbas is receiving medical treatment at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

An impressive motorcade of Secret Service vehicles were seen parked outside the Four Seasons Hotel in the Harbor East neighborhood of Baltimore.

Abbas’ Boeing 737 [A Boeing Business Jet, the most expensive private jet in the world, far better than aircraft used by most heads of legitimate states — such as The Netherlands, Chile, or Norway – ed.] landed at Baltimore–Washington International Airport at 3:00 PM EST after a short flight from White Plains, New York, according to the Flight Radar24 site. (snip)

Abbas’ medical treatment in Baltimore may explain the timing of his speech this week at the UN.

This past December, Haaretz reported that Abbas received an invitation to visit the White House for the second time in a year after the Trump administration was made aware that the Palestinian president was slated to be in the city for a medical procedure.

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American Rhythms By Eileen F. Toplansky

Posted By on February 26th, 2018

In Mitch Albom’s magical book titled The Magic Strings of Frankie Presto, “narrated by the voice of Music itself,” there is a singular line that describes what is sorely lacking in our world today. Many people speak of the cultural changes – perhaps even the cultural rot – demoralizing far too many Americans. Instead, we need, as Albom asserts, an understanding that “the secret is not to make your music louder but to make the world quieter.” Given the cacophony of brutal words spewed online via Twitter or by so many in show business and politics, we need a return to quiet introspection. It is imperative that we approach subjects with reason and logic rather than capitulate to the empty barrels that make the most noise.

In the world of education, it is long overdue to expect – in fact, demand – not perfection, but surely excellence. The soft bigotry of low expectations is producing a crop of young people who are functionally illiterate, historically ignorant, and frighteningly incoherent. For starters, the teaching of phonics must begin in kindergarten. I have college students who cannot sound out words or names because they were never taught how to use phonics. Moreover, students do not know what an anthology is because books are now replaced with readings on the internet. They have no clue about biblical or mythological allusions. There is a constant level of superficiality despite the plethora of information available to them. Few have learned the skills of separating the wheat from the chaff.

The so-called adults in the room are abdicating their responsibilities to mold and lead young people to make in-depth and thoughtful decisions. Instead, the focus is on who can scream the loudest and who can virtually blackmail higher authority. Facts are forsaken while censoring ideas is accepted, even applauded. This is not a good silence.

We need to return to ideas and language that evoke the sublime, not the gutter talk that pollutes so much conversation these days. We need to instill a return to the days of the “magic words” such as “please” and “thank you.” I cringe every time a person says “no problem” when I say “thank you.” It implies that being polite is a hardship in the first place.

Dizzy Gillespie once said, “It’s taken me all my life to learn what not to play.” In fact, “[s]ilence enhances music” just as pauses offer think time. But there are few rests in life anymore. It is a constant din.

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After Boko Haram Raid, Nigerians Try Again to Bring Girls Back The Feb. 19 attack was similar to the 2014 Chibok kidnapping, and 110 schoolgirls remain missing By Gbenga Akingbule and Joe Parkinson

Posted By on February 26th, 2018

DAPCHI, Nigeria— Garba Sule was preparing for evening prayers when heavily armed Boko Haram jihadists rode into town last week in pickup trucks, firing hundreds of rounds into the air and demanding directions to the local girls’ school.

The camouflage-clad militants loaded up dozens of students from the Dapchi Government Girls Science and Technical College and drove them into the surrounding scrubland, according to eyewitnesses, schoolteachers and local officials. Among them: Mr. Sule’s 13-year-old daughter, Zara.

A week after the Feb. 19 attack, 110 schoolgirls from this remote town in northeastern Nigeria remain unaccounted for, stunning Africa’s most populous nation and rekindling memories of Boko Haram’s seizure of 276 girls from Chibok Government Secondary School in 2014.

That earlier attack, initially ignored by Nigeria’s government, ultimately prompted a global activist movement—#BringBackOurGirls. About half of the kidnapped Chibok schoolgirls either escaped or were ransomed; 112 remain missing. At least 13 are presumed dead. Boko Haram continues to hold thousands of abducted boys and girls.

The latest episode has sparked outrage across Nigeria, where public anger has focused on authorities who initially refused to acknowledge the incident and then incorrectly claimed to have rescued the girls.

“We are in deep pain. We’ve hardly eaten,” said Mr. Sule, a 45-year-old researcher at the local hospital. “The government has lied to us, like they did with the Chibok girls.”

Over the weekend, President Muhammadu Buhari said in a tweet that the kidnapping was a “national disaster” and pledged to mobilize all the government’s resources to locate the girls. On Sunday, Nigeria’s air force confirmed it was assisting in the manhunt. CONTINUE AT SITE

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A New Regulatory Threat to Cancer Patients Washington may impose needless limits on genetic testing. By Olivier Elemento

Posted By on February 26th, 2018

The federal government is threatening to limit treatment options for doctors fighting cancer. A regulatory decision due Wednesday from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services could undermine the care delivered to the more than 1.6 million Americans who are diagnosed with cancer each year.

At issue is whether reimbursements will be available to most physicians, hospitals and patients for a diagnostic technology known as next-generation sequencing. A cornerstone of the emerging field of precision medicine, NGS tests analyze molecular changes that occur in cancerous tumors and show up in biopsies.

To fight tumors, DNA-sequencing-based tests can determine how genes and mutations differ from one patient to the next. NGS tests enable oncologists to prescribe and administer customized, highly targeted drug therapies. The technology limits patients’ exposure to unnecessary toxic drugs and helps doctors make vital treatment decisions. Hundreds of thousands of cancer patients have already received NGS testing.

The proposed new CMS policy would abruptly change the way NGS testing is regulated and administered. It would drastically limit insurance coverage by requiring that tests be approved by the Food and Drug Administration. Current NGS tests are conducted at accredited clinical laboratories and premier academic medical centers under strict regulation. They are as accurate and reliable as FDA-approved testing. There is no evidence that restricting reimbursement to FDA-approved tests would improve care.

Under the proposed policy, only one of hundreds of laboratories that currently offer NGS testing would meet all the new reimbursement requirements. The policy would in effect force clinicians and institutions to send all NGS testing to a single vendor, Foundation Medicine .