At National Journal, "Candidates who don't meet the criteria for the prime-time event will get to make their cases to voters on television earlier the same day."
Also at LAT, "New Hampshire fights to maintain its status in campaign season."
Thursday, June 11, 2015
New Video Shows Suspect Getting 'Horrific' Beating by Salinas Police
The never ending story.
We might as well take police off the job in America. They can't win no matter what the circumstances.
Watch, at CBS News San Francisco, "Use of Force by Salinas Police Under Scrutiny."
Also at the Monterey County Herald, "Man’s beating, arrest by Salinas PD caught on video."
We might as well take police off the job in America. They can't win no matter what the circumstances.
Watch, at CBS News San Francisco, "Use of Force by Salinas Police Under Scrutiny."
Also at the Monterey County Herald, "Man’s beating, arrest by Salinas PD caught on video."
Nyjah Huston Wins Gold in Men's Skateboard Street Final at X Games Austin 2015
Nyjah's freakin' incredible.
Hannah Davis Super Sexy Outtakes
For Sports Illustrated Swimsuit.
Here, "Fun and Sexy outtakes from Hannah Davis' SI Swimsuit 2015 shoot in Blackberry Farm, TN."
Here, "Fun and Sexy outtakes from Hannah Davis' SI Swimsuit 2015 shoot in Blackberry Farm, TN."
Bill O'Reilly's Talking Points: Back to Iraq
There's no difference between ISIS and the Nazi regime, yet still America dithers under Obama.
O'Reilly keeps hammering President Oppeasement:
PREVIOUSLY: "Obama: No Plan to Stop Islamic State."
O'Reilly keeps hammering President Oppeasement:
PREVIOUSLY: "Obama: No Plan to Stop Islamic State."
Wednesday, June 10, 2015
Anonymous Baltimore Cops to CNN: Public Asked for 'Softer' Police Force, They Got It (VIDEO)
At Gateway Pundit, "Baltimore Cops: “Public Asked for Softer, Less Aggressive Police Dept. & We’ve Given Them That” (VIDEO)."
BONUS: At Truth Revolt, "Prosecutor Had Asked Cops to Target Area Where Freddie Gray Was Arrested."
BONUS: At Truth Revolt, "Prosecutor Had Asked Cops to Target Area Where Freddie Gray Was Arrested."
Happy Birthday Kate Upton!
The lovely Ms. Upton turned 23 today.
BONUS: "Kate Upton Uncensored Topless Pic Leaks Online."
Help us wish two-time #SISwim cover model @KateUpton a happy birthday! We love you, Kate! http://t.co/VdMtT2PtMj pic.twitter.com/jYb3hR6CHv
— SI Swimsuit (@SI_Swimsuit) June 10, 2015
BONUS: "Kate Upton Uncensored Topless Pic Leaks Online."
Obama's Iraq Escalation Needs More Than 450 Advisors
As Charles Krauthammer was saying the other day on O'Reilly's, Obama's just going through the motions, looking to offload the Iraq clusterfuck onto the next presidential administration in 2017.
Hopefully, Islamic State won't use weapons of mass destruction before then.
At WSJ, "Obama’s Latest Iraq Escalation":
Still more.
Hopefully, Islamic State won't use weapons of mass destruction before then.
At WSJ, "Obama’s Latest Iraq Escalation":
President Obama all but admitted on Wednesday that his strategy against the Islamic State is failing by ordering an additional 450 U.S. military advisers to join the 3,500 already in Iraq. Alas, this looks like more of the half-hearted incrementalism that hasn’t worked so far.Yep, that's the fundamental problem. Obama is determined to double down on his abandonment of the Iraqi people and on his betrayal of the American troops who died to secure Iraq when Bush was still in office. This administration is treasonous.
The new troops won’t be used as spotters to call in airstrikes against Islamic State, much less join Iraqis at the front lines. Apache helicopters won’t provide air cover for Iraqi soldiers. There won’t be additional special forces to conduct raids against high-value targets. The highest ranking U.S. military officer will remain a mere two-star general.
Instead, the additional advisers will buttress Mr. Obama’s current strategy at the margins by putting Iraqi troops and Sunni tribesmen through a basic training course of between two and four weeks. This may be enough to show recruits how to march in drill and maintain and fire a AK-47.
But as retired four-star Gen. Jack Keane told us Wednesday, while the training is helpful, it “is insufficient to transfer a civilian to the physical, psychological and disciplinary demands of combat. And it doesn’t address the leader issue in terms of quantity or quality.”
That second point is vital, since the Iraqi army suffers from a dearth of competent and courageous leaders, particularly at the tactical levels of command. “We were not deserters,” one soldier told the pan-Arab daily Asharq al-Aswat after Mosul fell last June. “Our commanders abandoned us while we were sleeping in the night, and fled by helicopter.”
A similar point concerns the weapons the Administration now wants to rush to the Iraqis, including the Kurdish peshmerga and the Sunni tribes. The Kurds in particular need heavier weapons to deter Islamic State in Iraq’s north. But the danger of delivering stores of American arms to ill-led Iraqi troops has been plain every time they abandoned positions and equipment amid Islamic State advances, most recently during the fall of Ramadi.
Some of these deficiencies could no doubt be addressed by a more robust training program, though 450 more advisers is still too few. General Keane, who was instrumental in devising the surge strategy that saved Iraq in 2007, also makes the case for putting a three-star general in command of the effort—someone with the political clout and organizational pull that made Generals David Petraeus and Raymond Odierno so effective.
Mr. Obama’s mini-escalation includes setting up a new U.S. training base in Anbar province. This is progress, but it would do more good if it became the headquarters of a brigade combat team that would oversee the training and could help the Sunni tribes with medical evacuations, secure travel and force protection. A combat brigade is some 4,000 heavily equipped soldiers.
This kind of deployment would be a show of seriousness of the scale that’s needed to persuade Sunni Arabs to risk their lives against Islamic State. Iraqi soldiers may not have the officers they deserve, but they are still likely to fight if they know there’s an Apache helicopter clearing their advance. That dynamic took hold during the 2007 surge, when American successes emboldened the Iraqis to drive out the Shiite Mahdi Army from the southern city of Basra in 2008.
The fundamental problem with Mr. Obama’s strategy is that he is so determined to show that the U.S. isn’t returning to war in Iraq that he isn’t doing enough to win the war we are fighting...
Still more.
NPR's Diane Rehm Smears Socialist Bernie Sanders as 'Dual Citizen' of U.S. and Israel
Sanders was offended.
God, it's like leftists have run out of ideological enemies and have started to eat their own.
At Politico, "Bernie Sanders offended by Diane Rehm's Israeli citizenship question" (via Memeorandum).
God, it's like leftists have run out of ideological enemies and have started to eat their own.
At Politico, "Bernie Sanders offended by Diane Rehm's Israeli citizenship question" (via Memeorandum).
North Miami Senior High School Principal Fired for Comments Defending #McKinney Police Officer
Man, this is ominous.
At Gateway Pundit, "BREAKING: Principal LOSES JOB for Defending McKinney Police Officer Casebolt (VIDEO)."
And at the Miami Herald, "Miami-Dade schools remove principal after his post about police controversy":
That is a First Amendment violation, big time.
The collectivist-left. Destroying this once-great country one citizen at a time.
At Gateway Pundit, "BREAKING: Principal LOSES JOB for Defending McKinney Police Officer Casebolt (VIDEO)."
And at the Miami Herald, "Miami-Dade schools remove principal after his post about police controversy":
.@Cameron_Gray Tyranny has descended on this once great nation, big time.
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) June 10, 2015The principal of North Miami Senior High School inadvertently injected himself into the racially charged national debate over police treatment of blacks with a social media comment — and it wound up costing him his position at the school.Fired for stating his opinion. Fired. That's it.
The Miami-Dade County school district announced Wednesday that Alberto Iber had been removed as principal after going online to defend a white Texas police officer who waved a gun at black teens while responding to a call about an unruly pool party.
In a brief statement, the district said employees are required to conduct themselves, both personally and professionally, in a manner that represents the school district’s core values. The district said a replacement would be named shortly and that Iber would be reassigned to administrative duties.
“Judgment is the currency of honesty,” said Superintendent of Schools Alberto Carvalho. “Insensitivity — intentional or perceived — is both unacceptable and inconsistent with our policies, but more importantly with our expectation of common sense behavior that elevates the dignity and humanity of all, beginning with children.”
Cellphone footage from McKinney, Texas, caught white officer David Eric Casebolt throwing a black teenage girl to the ground, then briefly drawing his gun while responding to a call about an raucous pool party. The incident last week was just the latest in a string of encounters that have sparked charges of abusive police treatment of minorities.
Iber — in a brief public post on a story on the Miami Herald’s website — defended the officer’s response.
“He did nothing wrong,” Iber wrote in a comment that showed his Facebook picture, name, school and title. “He was afraid for his life. I commend him for his actions.”
Iber’s stance quickly prompted a passionate online response from Ambrose Sims, a black, retired Miami Beach Police veteran who joined the force at a time of racial strife in Miami in the 1980s. He also came out as gay and led a campaign for equal rights. Sims wrote, in part: “Such a comment reveals to me that you’re a serious part of the problem.”
Iber’s comment — which was removed after a few hours but not before being captured in screen grabs that were circulated in the community — also raised eyebrows in North Miami, a diverse city in northeast Miami-Dade where a majority of residents are black. The student body at his school also is 99 percent minority, according to state records.
Alix Desulme, a recently elected councilman who is Haitian-American and also a school teacher, said he was “appalled.”
“For him to make such a comment is insensitive to the community,” Desulme said.
Iber responded to a reporter’s questions on Tuesday by reading a prepared statement.
“I support law enforcement, and also the community and students that I serve as the proud principal of North Miami Senior High,’’ he said. “The comment I posted was simply made as the result of a short video that I watched and my personal opinion.”
Iber, who just finished his first year as the head of North Miami Senior, said he meant to write the comment anonymously.
“I regret that I posted the comment as it apparently became newsworthy and has apparently upset people,’’ he said. “That was not my intention in any way.”
That is a First Amendment violation, big time.
The collectivist-left. Destroying this once-great country one citizen at a time.
The Foolish Socialism of Bernie Sanders
From A. Barton Hinkle, at Reason, "Let the presidential candidate have his way and watch the U.S. economy implode":
That's the left's Big Lie of the 20th century --- and increasingly, the 21st.
A couple of weeks ago, Sanders took an uncompromising stand against deodorant proliferation. A growing economy doesn’t matter to most people if all the benefits of growth are going to the top 1 percent, he told CNBC: “You can’t just continue growth for the sake of growth. ... You don’t necessarily need a choice of 23 underarm spray deodorants or of 18 different pairs of sneakers when children are hungry in this country.”But remember, the left's elitist, know-it-all Marxists will argue that Cuba's "actually existing socialism" is a perversion of the genuine Utopian socialism of the Marxist dialectical ideal. Nothing proves socialism wrong "because it's never been tried."
Sanders doesn’t oppose deodorant per se, thank goodness. Rather, as a writer at Demos put it, Sanders would “gladly cut poverty and inequality even if it meant a reduction in superficial product innovation.”
He objects to “the dizzying (and socially useless) number of products in the deodorant category. ... (C)utting poverty and inequality is worth a reduction in innovation, and oh by the way, the kinds of things we call ‘innovation’ are often little more than new marketing gimmicks with dubious social value.” And that, friends and neighbors, is why “we should distribute the national income more evenly.”
This is superficially appealing. We can all think of products that strike us as stupid and useless (Uggs? Pickle-flavored potato chips? Country music?). And we can all think of better recipients for the money spent on them: Starving children. Endangered elephants. Cancer research. In what kind of universe does Kanye West deserve millions in income while homeless veterans are eating out of garbage cans?
But the superficial appeal quickly fades in the face of two competing considerations—one practical, the other principled.
For a peek at the practical argument, avail yourself of a fine little vignette from The Washington Post: “In an Online World, Cuba Remains a Stand-in-Line Society.” At Havana’s state-run retail hubs, reports Nick Miroff, “Customers with long shopping lists face no fewer than seven places to stand in line. One for butter. Another for cooking oil. A third for toothpaste. And so on.” The caption to a dismal accompanying photograph shows people waiting “hours for their government ration of chicken.”
This is what happens when central planners think they can allocate economic resources better than the unguided hand of individual free choice...
That's the left's Big Lie of the 20th century --- and increasingly, the 21st.
Road Rage Fight Caught on Tape
Well, dude who was cutting the other guy off got has ass kicked --- and he was nearly knocked into traffic and killed.
Sheesh.
Sheesh.
The Obama Administration is Obligating Schools to Deny Students Their Constitutional Rights
At great piece on "rape culture" authoritarianism, at Red Millennial, "The Constitution Does Not Apply When Feminist Goals Are at Stake."
Learn How Title IX Hurts the Accuser and the Accused http://t.co/Yiq6slCbKi #rapeculture #feminism #mattressgirl pic.twitter.com/tuBZTsHeLO
— Red Millennial (@RedMillennial) June 9, 2015New York Prison Break Manhunt Continues
At CBS News New York, "Manhunt Continues for Escaped Convicted Murderers," and "Investigators Seek Accomplices, Answers In Upstate Prison Escape."
Also at the New York Times, "How 2 Murderers Escaped From a New York Maximum-Security Prison, and the Manhunt That Followed."
Also at the New York Times, "How 2 Murderers Escaped From a New York Maximum-Security Prison, and the Manhunt That Followed."
In Major Setback for 'Pro-Choice' Ghouls, 5th Circuit Upholds Key Parts of Texas Anti-Abortion Law
Good.
At the Los Angeles Times, "Controversial Texas abortion law upheld by federal appeals court."
And at PuffHo, "Many Clinics Likely to Close as Federal Appeals Court Upholds Texas Abortion Restrictions."
Shut 'em down --- and good riddance to the murderous abortion hell holes.
At the Los Angeles Times, "Controversial Texas abortion law upheld by federal appeals court."
And at PuffHo, "Many Clinics Likely to Close as Federal Appeals Court Upholds Texas Abortion Restrictions."
Shut 'em down --- and good riddance to the murderous abortion hell holes.
Court Upholds Texas Pro-Life Law Closing Abortion Clinics, Saving 10,000 From Abortion http://t.co/R8LUPxep2I pic.twitter.com/oXjh9zxaHg
— LifeNews.com (@LifeNewsHQ) June 10, 2015Federal appeals court upholds strict Texas abortion law, a decision opponents say will shut most clinics in the state http://t.co/vqgf34yiqp
— Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) June 10, 2015Tuesday, June 9, 2015
Marco Rubio's 'Luxury Speedboat' is a Fishing Boat
The Internet was abuzz this morning with the New York Times' smear of Marco Rubio:
Ace of Spades HQ rips the Old Gray Lady to shreds, "NYT Reveals that Marco Rubio Once Spent $80,000 on a 'Luxury Speedboat'; Update: 'Luxury Speedboat' in Question is a Nice, but Hardly Luxe, Fishing Boat." Also, "Shots Fired: Super-Biased, Error-Ridden NYT Very Defensive About All Its Mistakes and Biases."
The troubled financial history of @MarcoRubio has created particular complications for his presidential campaign http://t.co/pn5YWXzCUk
— The New York Times (@nytimes) June 10, 2015Ace of Spades HQ rips the Old Gray Lady to shreds, "NYT Reveals that Marco Rubio Once Spent $80,000 on a 'Luxury Speedboat'; Update: 'Luxury Speedboat' in Question is a Nice, but Hardly Luxe, Fishing Boat." Also, "Shots Fired: Super-Biased, Error-Ridden NYT Very Defensive About All Its Mistakes and Biases."
Rubio's luxury speedboat....is a fishing boat. http://t.co/Vc5k6jamII pic.twitter.com/jnz7nKSjLa
— Hadas Gold (@Hadas_Gold) June 9, 2015Obama: No Plan to Stop Islamic State
O'Reilly hammers President Oppeasement:
More at NewsBusters, "Even CNN Anchors Stunned Obama Still Has No Strategy to Defeat ISIS."
More at NewsBusters, "Even CNN Anchors Stunned Obama Still Has No Strategy to Defeat ISIS."
Adios, America! The Left's Plan to Turn Our Country Into a Third World Hellhole
I'm at the college for my last full teaching Tuesday for the semester.
Shop for Ann Coulter's book at Amazon. She's been making quite a splash.
BONUS: Also excellent is Coulter's, Demonic: How the Liberal Mob Is Endangering America.
More blogging tonight and throughout the summer!
Shop for Ann Coulter's book at Amazon. She's been making quite a splash.
BONUS: Also excellent is Coulter's, Demonic: How the Liberal Mob Is Endangering America.
More blogging tonight and throughout the summer!
Real Bigotry in America
Alyssa Lafage nails it.
I used to have idiot trolls falsely smearing me as a "bigot" all the time.
Truth is, leftists are the real bigots. Hateful, vindictive bigots.
Ppl who believe they are entitled to have & share an opinion but scream BIGOT at anyone with a different viewpoint... That's REAL #bigotry
— Alyssa Lafage (@AlyssaLafage) June 7, 2015I used to have idiot trolls falsely smearing me as a "bigot" all the time.
Truth is, leftists are the real bigots. Hateful, vindictive bigots.
Australian Man Charged with Attempted Murder After Going on Bulldozer Rampage (VIDEO)
Maybe he got tired of all the trans this and trans that.
Sheesh.
At Telegraph UK, "A man in Australia has been charged with attempted murder after allegedly stealing a bulldozer and demolishing a house where a woman and her children lived."
Sheesh.
At Telegraph UK, "A man in Australia has been charged with attempted murder after allegedly stealing a bulldozer and demolishing a house where a woman and her children lived."
Three Different Futures for America
Peggy Noonan discusses Ian Bremmer's new book, Superpower: Three Choices for America's Role in the World.
See, "Choosing a Path in the World Ahead."
PREVIOUSLY: "What’s the Right Role for America in the World?"
See, "Choosing a Path in the World Ahead."
PREVIOUSLY: "What’s the Right Role for America in the World?"
Spanish Bullfighter Marco Galan Gored in Groin, Leaving Testicles 'Eviscerated' (VIDEO)
Man, talk about losing your manhood.
There's video at the link, via the Independent UK:
There's video at the link, via the Independent UK:
A Spanish bullfighter has been gored in the testicles http://t.co/5ynaaclyRL pic.twitter.com/iY5q1JXGvd
— The Independent (@Independent) June 9, 2015Is Social Science a Giant Left-Wing Conspiracy?
No, it's not.
It's really not.
But so many leftists are activists before social scientists the idea that social science isn't in fact a conspiracy might seem counterintuitive.
I could make a list of mainstream --- and even conservative --- political scientists, for example, to bolster the case. But again, it's counterintuitive. And there are so many so-called scholars like LaCour pushing narrative social science it's pretty ridiculous.
That said, I'd be interested to know exactly how much time Jesse Singal has spent in the halls of academe. If you're in the humanities and social sciences at most colleges or universities, it's probably a 10-to-1 ratio between leftists and conservatives. And those ideological predispositions definitely influence research programs and scientific norms. Take the idiots at Lawyers, Guns and Money as fairly representative of what you'll find at most campuses around the country. The rare conservatives or Republicans probably keep a low profile for fear of losing their jobs. It's pretty bad.
In any case, at least Singal's familiar with a lot of interesting research on the question, at New York Magazine, "Is Social Science a Giant Liberal Conspiracy?"
Still, it's indeed counterintuitive to suggest that academe's not a leftist conspiracy.
Previous LaCour blogging is here.
It's really not.
But so many leftists are activists before social scientists the idea that social science isn't in fact a conspiracy might seem counterintuitive.
I could make a list of mainstream --- and even conservative --- political scientists, for example, to bolster the case. But again, it's counterintuitive. And there are so many so-called scholars like LaCour pushing narrative social science it's pretty ridiculous.
That said, I'd be interested to know exactly how much time Jesse Singal has spent in the halls of academe. If you're in the humanities and social sciences at most colleges or universities, it's probably a 10-to-1 ratio between leftists and conservatives. And those ideological predispositions definitely influence research programs and scientific norms. Take the idiots at Lawyers, Guns and Money as fairly representative of what you'll find at most campuses around the country. The rare conservatives or Republicans probably keep a low profile for fear of losing their jobs. It's pretty bad.
In any case, at least Singal's familiar with a lot of interesting research on the question, at New York Magazine, "Is Social Science a Giant Liberal Conspiracy?"
Still, it's indeed counterintuitive to suggest that academe's not a leftist conspiracy.
Previous LaCour blogging is here.
Interview with Ex-Russian Internet Troll Lyudmila Savchuk
At Der Spiegel, "Paid as a Pro-Kremlin Troll: 'The Hatred Spills over into the Real World'."
Paid as a Pro-Kremlin Troll: 'The Hatred Spills over into the Real World' http://t.co/smxPSju2Pe
— SPIEGEL English (@SPIEGEL_English) June 1, 2015Measuring Gender Identity
It's amazing how much coverage the trans issue gets in the press, especially considering how extremely few people in this country are transgender.
At the New York Times, "The Search for the Best Estimate of the Transgender Population."
Hat Tip: Weasel Zippers, "Study Finds Just 0.3% of the U.S. Population Is “Transgender”..."
At the New York Times, "The Search for the Best Estimate of the Transgender Population."
#ProgPride As a gesture of solidarity, join in the transinsanity: Post your transgenderqueer name here http://t.co/XHcT0oLnao #TCOT
— The People's Cube (@ThePeoplesCube) June 8, 2015Hat Tip: Weasel Zippers, "Study Finds Just 0.3% of the U.S. Population Is “Transgender”..."
Separating Fact from Fiction in the McKinney, Texas Story — #McKinneyPoolParty
From Lee Stranahan, at Breitbart Texas.
Plus, don't miss Andrew Branca, at Legal Insurrection, "Video Analysis: McKinney Brawl Another Rush to Misjudgment?"
Facts are the first casualty in McKinney, Texas Story Pool Party Story | my latest http://t.co/ZWoVYvEVyH pic.twitter.com/o1sxjq7cKF
— Lee Stranahan (@stranahan) June 8, 2015Plus, don't miss Andrew Branca, at Legal Insurrection, "Video Analysis: McKinney Brawl Another Rush to Misjudgment?"
Russia Uses Money and Ideology to Fight Western Sanctions
This is interesting.
Very interesting.
At the New York Times:
Very interesting.
At the New York Times:
WASHINGTON — The war in Ukraine that has pitted Russia against the West is being waged not just with tanks, artillery and troops. Increasingly, Moscow has brought to bear different kinds of weapons, according to American and European officials: money, ideology and disinformation.More.
Even as the Obama administration and its European allies try to counter Russia’s military intervention across its border, they have found themselves struggling at home against what they see as a concerted drive by Moscow to leverage its economic power, finance European political parties and movements, and spread alternative accounts of the conflict.
The Kremlin’s goal seems to be to sow division, destabilize the European Union and possibly fracture what until now has been a relatively unified, if sometimes fragile, consensus against Russian aggression. At the very least, if Russia can peel off even a single member of the European Union, it could in theory prevent the renewal later this month of economic sanctions that are scheduled to expire absent the unanimous agreement of all member states.
President Obama arrived in Germany on Sunday for a Group of 7 summit meeting at which he plans to rally European allies to stand firm against Russia, especially as violence flares again in eastern Ukraine despite a shaky cease-fire. In the days leading up to his trip, both American and European officials publicly voiced concerns about President Vladimir V. Putin’s subterranean — and sometimes more overt — efforts to win allies in the West.
“As it tries to rattle the cage, the Kremlin is working hard to buy off and co-opt European political forces, funding both right-wing and left-wing anti-systemic parties throughout Europe,” Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. said in a speech last month at the Brookings Institution in Washington. “President Putin sees such political forces as useful tools to be manipulated, to create cracks in the European body politic which he can then exploit.”
That is a conclusion shared by Britain’s government.
“On the question of Russian money, yes, of course we are concerned about what is clearly a Kremlin strategy of trying to pick off, shall we say, the brethren who may be less committed or more vulnerable in the run-up to the June decision,” said the British foreign secretary, Philip Hammond, last week. “It will not have escaped the Kremlin’s notice that this is a unanimity process and they only need one.”
Whether the strategy will succeed remains uncertain.
American officials and European diplomats said they were confident for now that the sanctions would be renewed at a European Union summit meeting to be held in Brussels on June 25 and 26. Germany, the union’s most dominant member, supports extending sanctions until next January, and smaller nations may be loath to defy Berlin. But there is no appetite for adding more sanctions, as some American officials would like.
Russia’s efforts to influence the West have taken on different forms.
Russia has traditionally used its status as an energy supplier to sway customers in Europe, and it is now pressing countries in southeastern Europe, including struggling Greece, to support a new natural gas pipeline project with promises of economic benefits. Russian oligarchs have long kept so much of their money in Cypriot banks that the island nation is seen as a financial outpost for Moscow.
For several years, Russia has paid for a government-sponsored insert in newspapers and websites in 26 countries (including in The New York Times). More recently, it has proposed expanding RT, its international television network, which broadcasts in English and three other languages and delights in pointing out the foibles of the West, to French and German.
American and European officials have accused Moscow of financing green movements in Europe to encourage protests against hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, a move intended to defend Russia’s gas industry. And a shadowy “troll farm” in St. Petersburg uses Twitter to plant fake stories about chemical spills or Ebola outbreaks in the West.
Since long before the Ukraine crisis, money has been a means for Mr. Putin to try to shape events in the West...
Monday, June 8, 2015
Ezell Ford Protesters Threaten Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti — #BlackLivesMatter
I thought it was going to be a peaceful protest, but not so much.
The videos make it look like a dangerous situation. Very dangerous.
At Big Government, "EZELL FORD PROTESTERS THREATEN L.A. MAYOR ‘BEWARE THE DAY WE CHANGE OUR MINDS’."
And at CBS News Los Angeles, "Ezell Ford Shooting Protesters Confront LA Mayor Outside Home."
The videos make it look like a dangerous situation. Very dangerous.
At Big Government, "EZELL FORD PROTESTERS THREATEN L.A. MAYOR ‘BEWARE THE DAY WE CHANGE OUR MINDS’."
And at CBS News Los Angeles, "Ezell Ford Shooting Protesters Confront LA Mayor Outside Home."
Witnesses Speak Out Against Violent Black Thugs at 'Innocent Pool Party' in McKinney, Texas (VIDEO)
At Ace of Spades HQ, "So, This 'Texas Pool Party' Story Seems to be Premised on, Get This, a Huge Lie":
Facts Did Not Matter to McKinney Activists, Threatened to Bring ‘Farrakhan’ http://t.co/Mv8O7mqWXz
— Brandon Darby (@brandondarby) June 8, 2015Racism and police violence!Keep reading.
Yay! A new distraction to be outraged about!
Here's he real story -- narrated by a black resident of the neighborhood.
Benet Embry just wanted a respite from the heat when he went to his neighborhood pool Friday. Talking to CNN Monday about the national story that rolled out of that simple, mundane summer activity still has him pretty well dismayed.Embry was more emphatic in a FaceBook posting:
The 43-year-old African-American has lived in Craig Ranch, a planned community, for eight years. It's a nice place. Racially diverse. People get along there.
Thinking back on the pool party, he might have known it would be crowded. The invite to the party had earlier caught fire on Twitter and social media. Craig Ranch's strict homeowners' association rules prohibit bringing more than two guests to the pool.
So when crowds of teenagers showed up, huddling by the gate and shouting to let them in, things got out of hand. Some kids jumped over the fence, Embry said. A security guard tried to get them to leave but was outnumbered, so the guard called police.
Police would arrive, and one officer seen on a video later posted to YouTube, would be placed on administrative leave. The officer cursed at several black teenagers, yanked a 14-year-old girl wearing only a bikini to the ground and knelt on her back. He also unholstered his firearm and chased teenage boys as they approached him while he was trying to control the girl.
Shortly after the approximately seven minute video hit YouTube, many on social media alleged that the white officer was racist. The Texas NAACP called meetings because members suspected as much, its president, Gary Bledsoe, said on CNN Monday.
Embry disagrees.
"Let me reiterate, the neighbors or the neighborhood did not call the police because this was an African-American party or whatever the situation is," he said. "This was not a racially motivated event -- at all. This whole thing is being blown completely out of proportion."
Look, I LIVE in this community and this ENTIRE incident is NOT racial at all. A few THUGS spoiled a COMMUNITY event by fighting, jumping over fences into a PRIVATE pool, harassing and damaging property. Not EVERYTHING is about RACE. WE have other issues that NEED our attention other flights of made up make believe causes.So, this neighborhood has a pool that's open to residents only. Well, residents, and they can each bring two guests.
So guess what one teenaged resident did? She began advertising for a cookout/party, without clearing this with the other people -- you know, the other people who actually own the pool and have the right to use it on a hot weekend day -- and over a hundred teenagers -- strangers to the other residents -- showed up and took over the pool.
You know, the pool that the other people had paid for.
In fact, some residents say the teenagers began charging a fifteen dollar entry fee to the pool they owned (jointly) and had a right to use in quiet enjoyment.
That's the backstory here -- that 100+ teenagers with no right to be upon other people's property descended on the property, because one (1) resident broke the rules and began advertising widely for a pool party that she decided to hold, without clearing it with anyone.
And, maybe, decided to make some money on, charging $15 a head...
Turkey Faces Political Uncertainty
At the Wall Street Journal, "Turkey Faces a New Political Reality":
ISTANBUL—The surprisingly weak showing by Turkey’s ruling party in parliamentary elections is raising the specter of protracted uncertainty for a key U.S. ally facing mounting economic and national security challenges.Still more.
Sunday’s election upset derailed President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s bid to transform Turkey’s government into a strong presidential system with him at its head.
It also left the party he led for more than a decade scrambling to find a coalition partner to form a governing majority from among three parties hostile to his aims, and Mr. Erdogan himself to try to wield power without a majority from a post that technically is largely ceremonial.
“It’s going to be much harder for him to get what he wants,” said Steven Cook, a Turkey analyst at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, noting he is weaker within his own country. “The language he’s used over the past couple of years has alienated Turkish voters.”
Some of Turkey’s Western allies welcomed the brake on Mr. Erdogan’s rapidly growing power; a European official hailed the vote as a check on “the increasing Putinization” of Turkey’s political system.
Diplomats said a more diverse parliament could reverse a deterioration of relations with the U.S. and other North Atlantic Treaty Organization partners as well as the European Union, which Ankara seeks to join.
“Politics will be messy and noisy. There are difficult economic issues, difficult regional issues…but I think the republic is well-poised now to deal with them,” said Francis Ricciardone, a former U.S. ambassador to Ankara now at the Atlantic Council, a think tank. “This will be good for Turkey.”
But the election result also has fed fears that a volatile period of fractious coalition governments could destabilize Turkey at a time of gathering threats including a slowdown in growth, the threat of Islamic State militants across its southern borders and fragile peace talks to end a three-decade Kurdish insurgency that has cost 30,000 lives.
In Washington, the State Department praised the high turnout in Turkey’s elections over the weekend. “The United States looks forward to working with the newly elected parliament and with the future government,” it said.
Current and former U.S. officials said Mr. Erdogan’s setback could force him to moderate his political rule and set a less controversial path on the global stage.
But it was unclear whether that will make him a better partner for Washington, particularly on policies relating to the battle against Islamic State and internal issues like press freedoms.
President Barack Obama signaled on Monday that the U.S.’s priority with Turkey will be that it do more to cut off militant fighters flowing into Syria. The U.S. believes most of the Islamic State’s foreign fighters enter Syria from Turkey.
“If we can cut off some of that foreign fighter flow, then we are able to isolate and wear out [Islamic State] forces that are already there,” Mr. Obama said at the Group of Seven leaders meeting in Germany. Turkey has dramatically boosted intelligence cooperation with its western partners since last summer and has deported some 1,200 suspected foreign fighters seeking to cross into Syria...
Does 'Ending the Republican Drama' on Immigration Require Amnesty?
I hate amnesty.
I hate everything about it.
It's the most brutally unfair policy proposal in American politics, but it's more likely to be effected than anything else I can think of. And that's because of decades of bipartisan failure on U.S. immigration policy. But things are at such a critical mass nowadays, especially with the high proportion of Hispanics in the population, the amnesty issue will be the touchiest subject Republicans will face this year and next. It's going to be interesting, even brutal, you might say.
In any case, in an otherwise excellent essay, Carl's Jr. CEO Andrew Puzder argues that "every candidate should support a path to legal status..."
Even if they do, it's a gift to the Democrat Party. I hate it.
See, at WSJ, "Ending the Republican Drama About Immigration."
I hate everything about it.
It's the most brutally unfair policy proposal in American politics, but it's more likely to be effected than anything else I can think of. And that's because of decades of bipartisan failure on U.S. immigration policy. But things are at such a critical mass nowadays, especially with the high proportion of Hispanics in the population, the amnesty issue will be the touchiest subject Republicans will face this year and next. It's going to be interesting, even brutal, you might say.
In any case, in an otherwise excellent essay, Carl's Jr. CEO Andrew Puzder argues that "every candidate should support a path to legal status..."
Even if they do, it's a gift to the Democrat Party. I hate it.
See, at WSJ, "Ending the Republican Drama About Immigration."
Leftists Push for Release of Woman and Children from Illegal Alien Detention Centers
So far officials are resisting the depraved leftists, but it won't be long.
Our "sovereign" borders are meaningless nowadays.
At the Los Angeles Times, "Pressure builds to release mothers and children from immigrant detention centers":
The Unitarian Universalists are communists working to destroy the United States. What better way than to organize the invasion of aliens from Latin America, people who don't speak English, who don't share American values, and who will flood the social welfare agencies in a Cloward–Piven attack on the system? And these aliens will vote Democrat eventually, further propelling the Marxist-Leninist evisceration of this once great nation.
Man, we're doomed.
Our "sovereign" borders are meaningless nowadays.
At the Los Angeles Times, "Pressure builds to release mothers and children from immigrant detention centers":
Federal officials face increasing pressure to stop detaining immigrant families and release more than 1,300 mothers and children.More.
At least 600 families — many of whom fled violence in Central America — were being held at three federal detention centers, officials said recently.
As of April, half had stayed there less than a month and 70% for less than two months, according to a law enforcement official who asked not to be identified because the official was unauthorized to speak publicly.
More than 4,500 individuals were in family detention centers from July through April, the official said, with 67% of them released and 664 removed from the country.
The Unitarian Universalist Service Committee became the latest group to call on the government to end family detention. The group's leaders posted a petition on their website Friday demanding that the director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement release the children and mothers, including a woman who had attempted suicide and others who were pregnant.
"Neither ICE nor the private owners of its family detention centers are capable of providing the levels of care for vulnerable people like pregnant mothers that are even marginally acceptable by any humane, legal, moral or American standard," said Rachel Gore Freed, a program leader with the group who has visited the Karnes City, Texas, detention center.
Officials said a woman at the Karnes City detention center was under observation after suffering a wrist abrasion, but they denied there had been miscarriages or attempted suicides.
Gillian Christensen, an ICE spokeswoman, said the agency "takes very seriously the health, safety and welfare of those in our care."
The agency "is committed to ensuring that all individuals housed in our family residential centers receive timely and appropriate medical screenings and treatment," including "pregnancy screenings at arrival, onsite prenatal care and education, and remote access to specialists for pregnant women who remain in custody," she said.
Some pregnant women have been released, but decisions are made on a case-by-case basis, she said.
Last month, 136 Democratic members of Congress called on Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson to stop confining families. "We cannot continue to hear reports of serious harm to children in custody and do nothing about it," they said. "Detaining mothers and children in jail-like settings is not the answer."
An 18-year-old court settlement is complicating the situation. Flores vs. Meese required the U.S. to release migrant children or house them in the "least restrictive environment."
Immigrant rights advocates have sued, contending that family detention violated the Flores settlement...
The Unitarian Universalists are communists working to destroy the United States. What better way than to organize the invasion of aliens from Latin America, people who don't speak English, who don't share American values, and who will flood the social welfare agencies in a Cloward–Piven attack on the system? And these aliens will vote Democrat eventually, further propelling the Marxist-Leninist evisceration of this once great nation.
Man, we're doomed.
Chalkboards from 1917 Preserved at Emerson High School in Oklahoma City
This is the most amazing story.
At the Washington Post, "Haunting chalkboard drawings, frozen in time for 100 years, discovered in Oklahoma school."
Also at London's Daily Mail, "Lessons from the past: High school renovations reveal students' chalkboard drawings frozen in time at Thanksgiving 1917."
At the Washington Post, "Haunting chalkboard drawings, frozen in time for 100 years, discovered in Oklahoma school."
Chalkboards frozen in time in Oklahoma City Public Schools since 1917: http://t.co/Eoi8VTlZBP @USDEducation
— John Barnshaw (@JohnBarnshaw) June 7, 2015Also at London's Daily Mail, "Lessons from the past: High school renovations reveal students' chalkboard drawings frozen in time at Thanksgiving 1917."
U.S. Navy Fleet at San Diego Pivots to South China Sea
At the San Diego Union-Tribune:
Freedom of passage threats in So. China Sea prompts bigger U.S. presence in the region: http://t.co/vqov5itYav pic.twitter.com/j78GKkZxAh
— The Union-Tribune (@sdut) June 6, 2015
Ezell Ford Protesters Camp Out at Los Angeles Mayor's House
As long as it's peaceful, I guess.
I don't like Mayor Garcetti, so there's that.
At CBS Los Angeles, "Black Lives Matter Protesters Camp Outside Mayor Garcetti's Home."
I don't like Mayor Garcetti, so there's that.
At CBS Los Angeles, "Black Lives Matter Protesters Camp Outside Mayor Garcetti's Home."
Black Lives Matter Protesters Demand Mayor Garcetti Fire LAPD Chief Charlie Beck http://t.co/SdThM3Ejad
— CBS Los Angeles (@CBSLA) June 8, 2015The Myth of a Mighty Germany
From Parke Nicholson, at Foreign Affairs, "Berlin Isn't as Powerful as You Think."
Germany's soft power is stronger than ever, but it still comes up short on the global stage: http://t.co/oQCGiLmO2F pic.twitter.com/eJ1ONPsY4J
— Foreign Affairs (@ForeignAffairs) June 6, 2015More Abigail Ratchford
Here's the flashback to April, "Abigail Ratchford Washing the Mini Cooper."
And the latest from Playboy:
And the latest from Playboy:
How Title IX Became a Political Weapon
From Jessica Gavora, at WSJ, "Now that the law is used to suppress free speech, even liberals are alarmed. Where have they been?":
The road that took Title IX from a classically liberal antidiscrimination law to an illiberal gender-quota regime began in 1996 with an innocent-seeming “Dear Colleague” letter written by federal education officials in the Clinton administration. The letter targeted colleges and universities struggling to answer the difficult question of what constitutes (unlawful) discrimination under Title IX in sports programs that are already segregated on the basis of sex. It instructed schools that quotas—equalizing the participation of men and women in athletics, despite demonstrated disparities of interest—were the way to comply with the law.
Activists who had been instrumental in creating the new standard took the federal guidance and ran with it. Aided by the trial bar, they initiated lawsuits that enshrined the new bureaucratic “guidance.” The case brought against Brown University in the early 1990s by a coalition of feminists and trial lawyers set the stage. It alleged that Brown—which offered more women’s sports teams than men’s at the time—had violated the law by downgrading two women’s teams. The university produced reams of data showing that women at Brown had more opportunities to play sports than men, but more men than women played intramural sports by 3 to 1 and club sports by a whopping 8 to 1.
To the applause of the Clinton administration, the court ruled that such data didn’t matter. The responsibility of the school wasn’t to provide equal opportunity to participate in sports—it was to educate women to be interested in sports. In effect the ruling said that Brown women didn’t know what they wanted. They only thought they were dancers or actors or musicians. They had to be taught that they were really athletes. They didn’t know what was good for them but the government did.
With that, Title IX was transformed. It no longer mattered if schools offered equal or more-than-equal opportunities for women in athletics. If colleges couldn’t produce enough actual female bodies on the playing field, the schools were forced to cut male athletes until the participation rates of both sexes were the same. No legislation, let alone public discussion, made this so. When it comes to Title IX, quaint notions of the people’s representatives having anything to do with the law ended when the law passed.
The movement of Title IX into areas as remote as the mere discussion of sexual politics on campus has followed the same trajectory. Beginning in 2011 the Obama Education Department wrote “Dear Colleague” letters to schools. Suddenly, schools were responsible for harassment and assault that occur off campus. A lower standard of evidence was established to prove the guilt of the accused. Earlier protections for academic freedom and free expression were dropped.
With that, the pas de deux with activist groups commenced. Title IX investigations of accusations of sexual assault and harassment on campuses exploded. Just as they had with Title IX in sports, activists went in search of victims to be the media face of a rape crisis—and to become plaintiffs in litigation against schools.
The notorious and now-debunked story of the University of Virginia’s “Jackie” gang-rape is a case in point. Rolling Stone reporter Sabrina Rubin Erdely was, in her words, searching for a victim who would show “what it’s like to be on campus now . . . not only where rape is so prevalent but also that there is this pervasive culture of sexual harassment/rape culture.”
The new demands to combat what federal education officials also call a “rape culture” on campus are so excessive that even current and former Harvard Law professors have publicly complained that their school’s attempt to comply has undermined due process and is “overwhelmingly stacked against the accused.”
Sunday, June 7, 2015
The Pussyfication of the Male Sex
Ice-T nails it:
Plus, from Elizabeth Price Foley, at Instapundit:
Leftists have pussyfied this country, damn.
Rapper Ice T: Manhood is Dead; you’re dealing w/the pussyfication of the male sex http://t.co/w9ROJxSgSK #BruceJenner pic.twitter.com/6uVkxocjgP
— Wayne DuPree ★彡 (@WayneDupreeShow) June 7, 2015Plus, from Elizabeth Price Foley, at Instapundit:
.@AmPowerBlog Here's the link: http://t.co/M506iAxexB via @Instapundit
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) June 7, 2015Leftists have pussyfied this country, damn.
'Game of Thrones' Season Finale
I've got HBO on and their advertisement for tonight's "Game of Thrones" previews the epic season finale.
Here's WSJ, "‘Game of Thrones’ Season Finale is Called ‘Mother’s Mercy’."
And at Screen Crush, "‘Game of Thrones’ George R.R. Martin Wishes HBO Hadn’t Cut Lady Stoneheart."
The last two episodes air tonight and June 14th.
ADDED: Well, that was something else. Can't wait until next week.
Here's WSJ, "‘Game of Thrones’ Season Finale is Called ‘Mother’s Mercy’."
And at Screen Crush, "‘Game of Thrones’ George R.R. Martin Wishes HBO Hadn’t Cut Lady Stoneheart."
The last two episodes air tonight and June 14th.
ADDED: Well, that was something else. Can't wait until next week.
Why Did That Horrible Thing Happen on ‘Game of Thrones’? http://t.co/4Zav9Z33W7 #Got
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) June 8, 2015#GameofThrones took it to the extreme with that disturbing death scene. A showrunner speaks: http://t.co/9wUjVhxvg3 pic.twitter.com/JOcvbGHpE9
— Entertainment Weekly (@EW) June 8, 2015What’s the Right Role for America in the World?
Ian Bremmer, professor of global research at NYU, has a new book out: Superpower: Three Choices for America's Role in the World.
I'm pretty well full up on books for the next few weeks, thankfully, but this one looks to make my list for late summer.
Bremmer's also a columnist for Time, where he's got a series of recent posts on international relations. See, "Quiz: What’s the Right Role for America in the World?"
Plus, "America’s New Path Forward: How the U.S. can fix its dysfunctional foreign policy":
I'm pretty well full up on books for the next few weeks, thankfully, but this one looks to make my list for late summer.
Bremmer's also a columnist for Time, where he's got a series of recent posts on international relations. See, "Quiz: What’s the Right Role for America in the World?"
Plus, "America’s New Path Forward: How the U.S. can fix its dysfunctional foreign policy":
Here’s a question: What role does President Barack Obama believe the U.S. should play in the world? His words and his actions tell different stories. Obama’s speeches often detail a vision as grand as anything Ronald Reagan ever offered about America’s timeless greatness and its leadership in the world. At other times, Obama focuses on pragmatism and the need to set hard priorities. At still other times, he stresses the burdensome costs of an ambitious foreign policy with an urgency we haven’t heard from Washington since the 1930s.
Words aside, Obama’s deeds suggest that he’s not acting in the world so much as reacting to crises as they appear. The eruption of the Arab Spring in 2011, for example, caught the White House flat-footed. Eventual support for pro-democracy demonstrators in Egypt only opened a rift with Saudi Arabia, America’s closest Arab ally, that Obama is still scrambling to manage. In Syria, Obama threatened “enormous consequences” if President Bashar Assad employed chemical weapons on his country’s battlefields, only to back down and accept a Russian-brokered compromise when Assad went ahead and used those weapons on his own people. A crisis in Ukraine drew the President into a confrontation with Russia that stoked real conflict with little potential reward, beyond the satisfaction of defending a principle–and not even defending it very well.
But the U.S.’s foreign policy incoherence didn’t begin with Barack Obama. The intellectual drift and the growing gap between words and deeds dates back to the Cold War’s end. George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton’s joint misadventure in Somalia, George W. Bush’s ill-considered wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the near constant mishandling of relations with Russia and the halfhearted efforts to both engage and contain a rising China have taken a heavy toll on America’s treasury, credibility and self-confidence.
That toll will keep rising. The best-funded, most heavily armed terrorist group in history still occupies large sections of Iraq and Syria–capturing the Iraqi city of Ramadi on May 17–and now inspires followers from West Africa to Southeast Asia. Russia’s defiant leader will likely up the ante in Ukraine. The Prime Minister of Israel–one of America’s closest allies–will continue to fight the White House over Iran. China is challenging U.S. naval supremacy in the South China Sea and its economic dominance everywhere else.
At the same time, the U.S. itself has changed. The next President will have fewer options than Clinton, George W. Bush or even Obama, because the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have left the American public deeply reluctant to support any military action that might require a long-term U.S. troop presence. Without the credible threat of military commitment, the rest of our foreign policy tools become much less effective.
The world has changed too. Powerful allies like Britain, Germany, Japan and South Korea still care about what America wants, but they can’t create jobs and grow their economies without broader and deeper commercial relations with China. Emerging countries are not strong enough to overthrow U.S. dominance, but they have more than enough strength and self-confidence to refuse to follow Washington’s lead. The U.S. remains the world’s sole superpower, the only country able to project military power in every region of the world. Its cutting-edge industries and universities are second to none. But China is now the only country in the world with a carefully considered global strategy.
Listen to the next wave of presidential candidates, though, and you might think nothing has changed. “We have to use all of America’s strengths to build a world with more partners and fewer adversaries,” says Hillary Clinton. “If we withdraw from the defense of liberty anywhere,” warns Jeb Bush, “the battle eventually comes to us.” Marco Rubio tops them both: “The free nations of the world still look to America to champion our shared ideals. Vulnerable nations still depend on us to deter aggression from their larger neighbors. And oppressed people still turn their eyes toward our shores wondering if we hear their cries, wondering if we notice their afflictions.”
These and the other candidates rattle off long lists of foreign policy priorities, but they avoid any mention of the costs and the risks. They speak as if successful foreign policy depends mainly on faith in the country’s greatness and the will to use American power, with barely a nod to what the American public wants. They tell us America must lead–but they don’t tell us why or how.
Except in 1940 and 1968, presidential campaigns have rarely been fought over foreign policy....
*****
It’s not simply that America can no longer police the world. It’s that it has no right to force those who disagree with us to see things our way. Americans like to believe that democracy is so undeniably attractive and our commitment to it so obvious that others should simply trust us to create it for them within their borders. That’s just not the case. Some countries still want American leadership, but many around the world want less U.S. interference, not more. They love American technology, social media, music, movies and fashion. But they don’t much care what Washington thinks about how they should be governed, who their international friends should be and how they should manage their money.
This might sound like isolationism, a term that’s been the kiss of death in U.S. politics since World War II. But that word is an unfair dismissal of every legitimate concern Americans have about the obvious foreign policy excesses and costly miscalculations of their government. Those who want Washington to declare independence from the need to play Superman believe that the U.S. has profound potential that’s been wasted in mistakes overseas. Imagine for a moment that every dollar spent in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past dozen years had been spent instead to empower Americans and their economy. Redirect the attention, energy and resources we now squander on a failed superhero foreign policy toward building the America we imagine, one that empowers all its people to realize their human potential.
The Left's Attack on Pamela Geller Sanitizes Terrorism and Facilitates Murder
From Douglas Murray, at the Gatestone Institute, "The Self-Appointeds: Who Put Them in Charge of Free Speech?":
Hat Tip: Melanie Phillips.
PREVIOUSLY: "Pamela Geller Targeted in Foiled Boston Beheading Plot."
Something happened in America last week that cannot be passed over. There are two parts to it. The first is what happened. The second is what happened in response.Still more.
On Tuesday, June 2, a 26-year old man, Usaama Rahim, was shot and killed by a Boston Police officer and FBI agent. Boston Police and federal law enforcement sources say that Rahim, who made a living as a security guard, was under surveillance. Officials believe that he was radicalized by ISIS and was planning to behead someone. One name that apparently came up in his conversations was that of blogger and activist Pamela Geller. However, Rahim subsequently appears to have decided to target what he called in one conversation the 'boys in blue' (the police). On the basis of Rahim's conversations, the police and FBI anti-terror investigators decided it was time to move in. When they did so, Rahim threatened them with a military-style knife, and after refusing to give it up, was shot dead by a police officer and FBI agent.
This is the sort of event that can now happen on a regular basis in America and other Western countries. The ability of ISIS to reach and influence citizens far away from Iraq and Syria has been shown a number of times to date, most recently last month in Garland, Texas, where two men attempted to attack a Mohammed cartoon contest organized by Pamela Geller. That is what happened. But what happened next in some ways deserves more focus.
In the hours after the shooting, there was intense media interest in what the police knew about the dead suspect. The name of Ms. Geller came out. And something subtly changed. In a set of media interviews with Ms. Geller and with her colleague at the American Freedom Defense Initiative, Robert Spencer, their interviewers expressed relief that they were safe -- and then turned on them.
The nadir was an interview on CNN conducted by Erin Burnett, where the news anchor questioned Ms. Geller down the line. The interview is well worth watching, if for nothing else than for what should become a seminal example of the mess the West has got itself into on these questions. The interviewer got herself into an oddly self-strangulating position from the start when she mentioned to Geller, "Obviously the Prophet Mohamed cartoon exhibition in Texas -- you were the one behind that. Obviously people died during that. There was a gunfight." This is presenting facts in a weirdly neutral light. Of course, as Geller pointed out to Burnett, it was not the case that "people died" during the cartoon exhibition. Two men who came to the event, apparently intent on mass murder, fired at police officers and security guards (wounding one), and were then themselves killed by police returning fire. But it soon became clear that this was just the groundwork of a bigger point that the CNN interviewer was gearing up to make.
"On that 'Draw Mohammed' cartoon event in Texas, obviously you know some people see it very differently from how you see it. You see it as an art event. They see it as showing pictures of the Prophet Mohammed, who should not be drawn. You know, obviously you've done other things." At this point, the interviewer raised the ads that Pamela Geller sponsored on the New York City subway, which said, "In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man. Support Israel. Defeat Jihad." The CNN interviewer then went on to her question: "Are you surprised that there are some who would want to target you for words like that?"
There is much to be said about this. Why, for instance, would anyone want to behead someone for posting an advertisement attacking "savages"? To show that they are not savage? It certainly does not follow that such an advertisement would inevitably lead to violence. In any event, the interviewer's piece had not yet reached its lowest point. That came when Burnett brought up the "Southern Poverty Law Center" (SPLC), which the interviewer said "track[s] hate groups in this country." Pamela Geller is on the Southern Poverty Law Center's list of "hate groups."
And then came the humdinger. "They track hate groups. They're putting you on that list. Nothing justifies a beheading or a beheading plot. But..."
It is often rightly said on vital questions of our time that everything up to the "but" is throat-clearing. It is what everybody expects you to say and everything you need to say. It is what happens after the "but" that matters. On this occasion, Burnett went on, "But it's important to note this. I mean, are you stoking the flames? Do you on some level relish being the target of these attacks?"
There is a whole thesis in the presumptions behind those questions. The idea that a self-designated highly politicized institution such as the Southern Poverty Law Center gets to say who is hateful and who is not would be a starter. As would be the unquestioning acceptance of the methods of such organizations ('Hope not Hate' in the UK being another example), which appear to be doing a lining-up of targets that they would most certainly and rightly damn anyone else for.
But a pattern of thought about this beheading plot emerged. It was the same pattern that showed itself hours later when Robert Spencer was interviewed on CNN and asked, strangely, what he had done before the attempted attack to reach out to the Islamic community in Boston. The presumption at work, of course, is that Geller and Spencer have brought these beheading plots and assassination attempts on themselves. If this sounds familiar, it is because it is. This is exactly what we heard from certain people across the political spectrum in the wake of the January murders in France of the staff of the satirical magazine, Charlie Hebdo, and after the murder of a filmmaker and the attempted murder of many others taking part in a free speech event in Copenhagen weeks after that.
Hat Tip: Melanie Phillips.
PREVIOUSLY: "Pamela Geller Targeted in Foiled Boston Beheading Plot."
The New Israeli Government's War on BDS
From Caroline Glick, at FrontPage Magazine:
More.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s new government is less than a month old, but it’s already apparent that it is different from its predecessors. And if it continues on its current diplomatic trajectory, it may do something that its six predecessors failed to accomplish. Netanyahu’s new government may improve Israel’s position internationally.It's a Holocaust of moral inversion, yet still, Israel will win the BDS leftist-terrorists will lose. Thank God.
The stakes are high. Over the years, Israel has largely concentrated its efforts on developing the tools to contend with its military challenges. But as we have seen over the past decade and a half, Israel’s capacity to fight and defeat its enemies is not limited principally by the IDF’s war-fighting capabilities.
Israel’s ability to defend itself and its citizens is constrained first and foremost by its shrinking capacity to defend itself diplomatically. Its enemies in the diplomatic arena have met with great success in their use of diplomatic condemnation and intimidation to force Israel to limit its military operations to the point where it is incapable of defeating its enemies outright.
The flagship of the diplomatic war against Israel is the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement.
Participants in the movement propagate and disseminate the libelous claim that Israel’s use of force in self-defense is inherently immoral and illegal. Over the years BDS activists’ assaults on Israel’s right to exist have become ever more shrill and radical. So, too, whereas just a few years ago their operations tended to be concentrated around military confrontations, today they are everyday occurrences. And their demands become greater and more openly anti-Semitic from week to week and day to day.
Consider the events of the past seven days alone.
Late last week Israel fended off a major international effort led by Palestinian Authority Soccer Federation chairman and former terrorist chief Jibril Rajoub to expel it from the Fédération Internationale de Football Association. Not only is Rajoub a man with blood on his hands. The Fatah luminary is admired by the Israeli far-Left while also being a favorite of Qatar, the chief state sponsor of the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas.
Rajoub is sympathetically inclined toward enabling Hamas in Gaza to expand its presence in Judea and Samaria.
Before the government had a chance to sigh in relief that FIFA was settled, Britain’s National Union of Students voted to join the BDS movement. This means that the anti-Israel demonstrations and assaults that take place several times a week at Britain’s universities will now take place under the NUS banner.
Also Wednesday, the French telecom giant Orange’s CEO Stéphane Richard told reporters in Cairo that he wishes to cut off his contract with Israel’s Partner telecommunications company, one of Israel’s largest cellular telephone services providers.
Richard was apparently coerced into making his statement by the Egyptian BDS movement which has threatened to boycott Orange’s subsidiary in Egypt due to its contract with Partner.
Tuesday it was reported that last month the Dutch government issued a travel advisory to its citizens traveling in Israel. In an act of anti-Jewish inversion now common in the Western discourse about Israel and its enemies, the Dutch government warned that Jews in Judea and Samaria constitute a threat to Dutch travelers because they throw stones “toward Palestinian and foreign vehicles.”
In the US, the Anti-Defamation League reported that this past academic year there was a 38 percent rise in anti-Israel events on college campuses over the previous year. The number of BDS campaigns doubled over the previous academic year.
By ADL’s count, there were 520 anti-Israel events on campuses. BDS campaigns were initiated on 29 campuses.
At the UN, Tuesday “The Palestinian Return Center,” Hamas’s European chapter, was granted official status as a recognized nongovernmental organization by the UN’s Commission on NGOs. Now, thanks to the commission, Hamas terrorists can participate in UN meetings, have full access to UN facilities and wear their new, official UN badges.
Incidentally, the same commission rejected a request by ZAKA to receive the same status. ZAKA is an Israeli NGO that provides first aid and handles the remains of terrorism victims and victims of major disasters in Israel and worldwide.
Also at the UN, Leila Zerrougui, the envoy for children in armed conflicts, is pushing to get the IDF added to the blacklist of groups that harm children.
Boko Haram, Islamic State, al-Qaida and the Taliban are among the current names of the list.
Wednesday Republican Sen. Ted Cruz sent a pointed letter to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemning Zerrougui’s actions. Cruz threatened, “Congress will have no choice but to reassess the United States’ relationship with the United Nations and consider serious consequences if you choose to take this action.”
In contrast to Cruz’s position, in his interview with Channel 2 broadcast Tuesday, US President Barack Obama indicated that due to the rising tide of anti-Israel sentiment and campaigns, if Israel doesn’t make unreciprocated concessions to the PA then the administration will have no choice but to join the anti-Israel UN bandwagon.
The time has come, then, for Israel to take the wheels off the wagon.
More.
Latest Anti-Police Brutality Martyr Was Doing Mushrooms Before Attacking Police and Getting Himself Killed
It's Feras Morad, who leftists claim is a "victim" who needed help.
Actually, he was a drug-addled loser who attacked a cop while tripping on mushrooms, and paid for it with his life.
Bad things happen when you take "recreational" drugs. This loser proves it.
Actually, he was a drug-addled loser who attacked a cop while tripping on mushrooms, and paid for it with his life.
Feras Morad was hopped up on mushrooms and attacked a policeman? No wonder he's dead. #FerasMorad http://t.co/gVRIWfddMJ
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) June 7, 2015Bad things happen when you take "recreational" drugs. This loser proves it.
Awesome #AmericanPharoah Wins Belmont Stakes and Triple Crown!
That was something else.
At LAT, "American Pharoah wins the Belmont Stakes and Triple Crown":
At LAT, "American Pharoah wins the Belmont Stakes and Triple Crown":
#AmericanPharoah OMG!
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) June 6, 2015.@lamblock That was! My heart was pounding and I'm screaming, "OMG! OMG!!" #AmericanPharoah
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) June 6, 2015The wait is over. History has been made. The sporting world has its newest hero.More.
On a near-perfect Saturday at Belmont Park in Elmont, N.Y., American Pharoah became the first winner of horse racing’s Triple Crown in 37 years. He now takes his place as racing royalty by becoming the 12th horse to win this three-race series.
The 3-year-old colt was spectacular in winning the grueling 1 1/2-mile race. American Pharoah’s quest started five weeks ago when he won the Kentucky Derby and followed that up two weeks later by winning the Preakness Stakes.
American Pharoah broke slowly but went immediately to the lead and held about a 3/4-length advantage over Materiality through the backstretch and into the final turn.
The race was very moderately paced, meaning that the front-running style of American Pharoah might hold up.
It more than did that.
As American Pharoah entered the home stretch, he had about a length on the late-charging Frosted and wasn’t giving up any ground. With 1/8 of a mile to go he widened his lead and pulled away from the field for an uncontested and unquestioned victory. His winning margin was 5 1/2 lengths.
“I think it's is owed to the fans of New York who kept showing up, paying their money and hoping,” trainer Bob Baffert said of the Triple Crown. “I still cant believe it happened and I’m just blessed with a super 3-year-old by the name of American Pharoah. I couldn’t be happier.”
Jockey Victor Espinoza talked about how confident he was in American Pharoah before slipping into some numerology.
“Twelfth Triple Crown,” Espinoza said. “I have 12 brothers and sisters: 12-12.”
American Pharoah paid $3.50, $2.80 and $2.50. Frosted finished second and returned $3.50 and $2.90. Keen Ice was third paying $4.60.
Baffert and Espinzoa, who both make Southern California their home, are now in the rarified air of being the only active people in their professions to have won a Triple Crown.
This was the fourth time that Baffert had found himself going for a Triple Crown. Earlier attempts with Silver Charm (1997), Real Quiet (1998) and War Emblem (2002) all came up short. It was Espinoza’s third time going for the Triple Crown. He was the jockey for War Emblem and last year with California Chrome.
The win is a much-needed boost to horse racing, which has been in decline for many years. Recent movies have been made about two horses, Seabiscuit and Secretariat, that have rekindled America’s love affair with the horse.
But those horses are so long gone and no equine superstar has stepped up to take their place.
Now there is one...
Bearish on HRC
From Megan McArdle, at Bloomberg, "Clinton Support Has Nowhere to Go But Down":
And here's Fred Barnes, "The Coming Democratic Panic."
PREVIOUSLY: "Secret Memo Shows Leftist Contributors Souring on Hillary Clinton Campaign (VIDEO)."
I've long been bearish on Hillary Clinton. It isn't that I particularly dislike her; I don't, and there are certainly a number of presidential aspirants that I like less. I'm simply puzzled at what seems to be the conventional wisdom among Democrats I meet: that Clinton basically has a lock on the presidency, and the next 18 months are a tiresome formality we have to go through in order to set the right tone for her swearing in.More.
My bearishness had a bit of confirmation this week: a poll showed that Clinton had dropped from massive double-digit leads over plausible Republican presidential contenders to something more in the range of 1-3 points. Tempting though it is to leap on a single piece of data and declare victory, I will ruthlessly squash this primitive urge. It's a single poll, and others will likely show Clinton with more commanding leads in the near term.
However, I do think that Fred Barnes is right that as the polls narrow, we can expect to see some panic from the Democrats. By allowing Clinton to take the lion's share of the fundraising dollars and the media attention, the party has left itself without a plausible alternative candidate. That seemed dandy as long as she was easily trouncing Republicans in polls. But those polls were always going to narrow, because the early polls were basically measuring whether people recognized the candidate's name, not whether they were going to vote for her more than a year hence. As the GOP race sorts out, and the front-runners achieve more public awareness, you're going to see our highly partisan electorate lock into much narrower margins.
Moreover, Clinton will have less room to improve her margins than whoever the Republican is...
And here's Fred Barnes, "The Coming Democratic Panic."
PREVIOUSLY: "Secret Memo Shows Leftist Contributors Souring on Hillary Clinton Campaign (VIDEO)."
Saturday, June 6, 2015
Laid-Off Employees Train the Foreign Workers Who Were Hired to Replace Them
At the New York Times, "Pink Slips at Disney. But First, Training Foreign Replacements":
Diversity is strength! War is peace! Freedom is slavery!
Still more.
ORLANDO, Fla. — The employees who kept the data systems humming in the vast Walt Disney fantasy fief did not suspect trouble when they were suddenly summoned to meetings with their boss.But wait, we're a nation of immigrants, blah blah.
While families rode the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train and searched for Nemo on clamobiles in the theme parks, these workers monitored computers in industrial buildings nearby, making sure millions of Walt Disney World ticket sales, store purchases and hotel reservations went through without a hitch. Some were performing so well that they thought they had been called in for bonuses.
Instead, about 250 Disney employees were told in late October that they would be laid off. Many of their jobs were transferred to immigrants on temporary visas for highly skilled technical workers, who were brought in by an outsourcing firm based in India. Over the next three months, some Disney employees were required to train their replacements to do the jobs they had lost.
“I just couldn’t believe they could fly people in to sit at our desks and take over our jobs exactly,” said one former worker, an American in his 40s who remains unemployed since his last day at Disney on Jan. 30. “It was so humiliating to train somebody else to take over your job. I still can’t grasp it.”
Disney executives said that the layoffs were part of a reorganization, and that the company opened more positions than it eliminated.
But the layoffs at Disney and at other companies, including the Southern California Edison power utility, are raising new questions about how businesses and outsourcing companies are using the temporary visas, known as H-1B, to place immigrants in technology jobs in the United States. These visas are at the center of a fierce debate in Congress over whether they complement American workers or displace them...
Diversity is strength! War is peace! Freedom is slavery!
Still more.
The First Wave at Omaha Beach
At the Atlantic:
From the Archives: First Wave at Omaha Beach #DDay71
http://t.co/oee3ebPfzJ pic.twitter.com/HivpRM1W81
— The Atlantic (@TheAtlantic) June 6, 2015The Boys of Pointe du Hoc
They lost so many. Man.
And Reagan's speech is at RealClearPolitics.
U.S. Army Rangers after landing at Pointe Du Hoc. In the end they would suffer 70% casualties. #WW2 #DDay71 pic.twitter.com/Yx3UfvxIUH
— WWII Pictures (@WWIIpix) June 6, 2015And Reagan's speech is at RealClearPolitics.
You Can't Be Serious! Sepp Blatter Boinked Smokin' Supermodel Irina Shayk?!!
Sepp Blatter is 79 years old. Thirteen years ago he would have been 66. Now while it's not unthinkable that he'd be boinking Irina Shayk at the time, the thought is just unreal.
Ms. Shayk would've been just 16 in 2002, the start date for a potential romantic liaison with Mr. Blatter, according to London's Daily Mail, "Cristiano Ronaldo's ex-girlfriend model Irina Shayk insists 'pathetic' Spanish media claims she had an affair with Sepp Blatter are 'wholly unfounded'."
Bummer for Bradley Cooper.
Ms. Shayk would've been just 16 in 2002, the start date for a potential romantic liaison with Mr. Blatter, according to London's Daily Mail, "Cristiano Ronaldo's ex-girlfriend model Irina Shayk insists 'pathetic' Spanish media claims she had an affair with Sepp Blatter are 'wholly unfounded'."
Bummer for Bradley Cooper.
Does Bradley Cooper care about Irina Shayk and Sepp Blatter rumours? Hell no http://t.co/3NlIREeU4c pic.twitter.com/ShVLyDA7w2
— Daily Mail Celebrity (@DailyMailCeleb) June 6, 2015John C. McManus, The Dead and Those About to Die: D-Day: The Big Red One at Omaha Beach
I've been needing to read something besides Stephen Ambrose, as much as I love his books.
Today's the 71st anniversary of the D-Day landing, so I'm going to read a couple of chapters of John McManus's book this afternoon, The Dead and Those About to Die: D-Day: The Big Red One at Omaha Beach.
Today's the 71st anniversary of the D-Day landing, so I'm going to read a couple of chapters of John McManus's book this afternoon, The Dead and Those About to Die: D-Day: The Big Red One at Omaha Beach.
Woman Hit by Broken Bat at Fenway
She got fucked up.
At the O.C. Register, "Woman suffers life-threatening injuries after being hit by broken bat at Red Sox game."
And at the Boston Globe, "Fan badly hurt by broken bat at Fenway."
Watch: "Full Video - Woman Hit By Broken Bat at Fenway Park."
At the O.C. Register, "Woman suffers life-threatening injuries after being hit by broken bat at Red Sox game."
And at the Boston Globe, "Fan badly hurt by broken bat at Fenway."
Watch: "Full Video - Woman Hit By Broken Bat at Fenway Park."
June 1944: More Than Fight on D-Day Beaches
From Barrett Tillman, at RealClearHistory:
In June 1944 a celestial observer in low orbit would have marveled at the immense breadth and variety of violence on Planet Earth. It was a watershed period in World War II, and not only Operation Overlord in Normandy on June 6. That month truly defined the phrase “world war.”More. Plus more articles on D-Day at RCH.
On June 4, Allied forces entered Rome, liberating the Eternal City after nine months of muddy, bloody slogging up the Italian boot. The U.S. Fifth Army received the credit, but the victory also belonged to Britons, New Zealanders, South Africans, Frenchmen, Poles, Indians and Gurkhas; even some Brazilians. But at the end of the war in May 1945, enemy forces still owned northern Italy. In fact, the Axis — outnumbered six to one and out-produced beyond computing — tied the rest of the world in knots for six years, including America, the British Empire, China, and the Soviet Union.
Also in Italy, the frequently forgotten U.S. Fifteenth Air Force — responsible for destroying Hitler’s oil supply — flew its first shuttle mission to Russia. Between June 2 and 11, nearly 200 bombers and fighters attacked German targets in Romania while staging out of Soviet bases.
Meanwhile on the Eurasian landmass, Russia prepared a massive blow. Along the Donets the Wehrmacht still occupied land several hundred miles east of Kiev. Four Soviet army groups — 124 divisions with 1.2 million men — were poised to strike, a cocked fist with an armored avalanche of 5,200 tanks and massive artillery on a scale that only Russians have ever managed. Half a million Germans awaited the blow on Army Group Center.
In northeastern India, British imperial forces shot it out with determined Japanese attackers (the only kind the emperor had) at Imphal, which controlled the only all-weather highway on the Burmese frontier. In that soggy jungle, soldiers on both sides watched their uniforms mold and weapons rust almost before their eyes. Tokyo’s hope of seizing the jewel in Britain’s crown died in the rot and decay of Manipur Province.
Meanwhile, American power also projected westward that June. On the opposite side of the globe...
Friday, June 5, 2015
USS Carl Vinson Back in San Diego
At the San Diego Union-Tribune, "Vinson strike group comes home: Carrier did 6 months of airstrikes against ISIS during marathon deployment":
The five ships of the Carl Vinson carrier strike group returned home Thursday after a marathon deployment, including six months of dropping bombs on Islamic jihadists in Iraq and Syria.More.
At piers around San Diego Bay, there were kisses, tears and long sighs of relief.
“I’m immensely proud of the 6,000 men and women of the Carl Vinson carrier strike group,” said Rear Adm. Christopher Grady, the group’s commander. “I hope you are, too.”
He was speaking from a pier at North Island Naval Air Station, where the Vinson had just docked to the cheers of waiting family members.
Signs in the crowd spoke of feelings pent up during the nearly 10-month odyssey — the longest scheduled deployment since the Vietnam era.
One said, “#300 Days Without You.” Another read, “We Made It.”
“It was really hard,” said Keila Bennekin, 29, who was five months pregnant when her sailor husband, Anthony, departed with the Vinson on Aug. 22.
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