Jews could flee Germany on a 'massive' scale unless urgent action is taken against anti-Semitism, says foreign minister
By Ross Ibbetson
Daily Mail
January 26, 2020
Jews could flee Germany on a 'massive' scale unless urgent action is taken against anti-Semitism, the foreign minister warned today.
Writing in Der Spiegel on the eve of the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said anti-Jewish insults and attacks, in real life and online, had become 'a daily occurrence'.
Almost one in two Jews had considered leaving Germany, he said, a country that has long taken pains to confront its Nazi past.
'We need to take urgent counter-measures to make sure that such thoughts do not turn into a bitter reality and lead to a massive departure of Jews from Germany,' he wrote.
The fight against anti-Semitism would be a priority when Germany takes over the rotating EU presidency in July and the chairmanship of the Council of Europe, the bloc's leading human rights body, in November, Maas vowed.
Germany will push for tougher legal consequences for anti-Semitic acts, he said, and for more EU nations to make Holocaust denial a crime - currently illegal in over a dozen member states including Germany, Belgium and Italy.
Berlin will also step up the battle against anti-Jewish hate speech and disinformation on social media, Maas wrote, saying perpetrators 'should feel the full force of the law across Europe'.
An anti-Semitic attack in the eastern German city of Halle in October - in which a gunman tried but failed to storm a synagogue before killing a passer-by and a customer at a kebab shop - showed that 'Jewish sites and communities' needed better protection 'everywhere in Europe'.
To help make that happen, Germany will contribute 500,000 euros (£420,000) to the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) this year, Maas said.
The diplomat stressed the importance of educating young people about the horrors of World War II, when six million Jews were murdered by the Nazis.
Research had shown that 'a third of young Europeans indicated knowing little to nothing about the Holocaust,' he said.
The comments came on the same day a YouGov survey found 56 percent of Germans were in favour of making a school visit to a concentration camp mandatory.
Elderly Holocaust survivors will gather in Auschwitz on Monday to mark 75 years since Soviet troops liberated the camp, while world leaders held a sombre remembrance ceremony in Jerusalem last Thursday.
More than 1.1 million people, mainly Jews, were killed at Auschwitz-Birkenau. Most died in the gas chambers but many also succumbed to starvation, disease and overwork.
EDITOR’S NOTE: This is just one example of why a secure Israel is so important … it serves as a place of refuge for Jews who are persecuted in their home countries.
Monday, January 27, 2020
THANKS TO GOTT IM HIMMEL, BO WILL NOT BE EXECUTED
Georgia prisoner dies years after racist juror admits wondering 'if black people even have souls'
by Lauren Floyd
Daily Kos
January 26, 2020
A Georgia inmate died Friday, Jan. 24 after spending years fighting the jury decision that landed him on death row after he argued a racist juror negatively impacted his case, according to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Keith “Bo” Tharpe died at 61-years-old at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison of what the organization representing him reported were likely complications resulting from cancer. His case had earlier went before the U.S. Supreme Court leading to a stay of his execution after what was planned to be his last meal Sept. 26, 2017, the AJC reported.
Although Tharpe was sentenced in the death of his sister-in-law Jaquelin Freeman in 1991, the exposure of juror Barney Gattie’s multiple racist comments seven years later brought new light to the case. “After studying the Bible, I have wondered if black people even have souls, ” Gattie said in a signed affidavit cited in a Supreme Court decision. The racist also called Tharpe the n-word in the affidavit. “There are two types of black people: 1. Black folks and 2. N----rs,” he said.
Gattie added that Tharpe, “‘who wasn’t in the ‘good’ black folks category in [his] book, should get the electric chair for what he did.” Still, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied Tharpe’s appeal of the verdict after concluding “he had not made an adequate showing that Gattie’s racial bias affected the jury’s verdict.” Although the Supreme Court disagreed with that decision and sent the case to an appeals court, Tharpe was unsuccessful in his appeal due in part to a procedural flaw the state of Georgia prompted.
Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor said in the writ decision: “Before this Court, Tharpe argues that he could not have raised his racial-bias claim in a motion for new trial or on direct appeal because he did not know—indeed, could not have known—of the predicate facts of the claim at that time… If preserved, that argument would have force. But Tharpe did not make this argument before the District Court until a footnote in his reply brief in the Federal Rule of Civil Procedure...” Therefore, an appeals court was forced to limit its consideration only to a claim Tharpe made that he had ineffective assistance, which didn’t lead to an overturned verdict for Tharpe. The Supreme Court ultimately chose not to hear Tharpe’s appeal, according to the court decision. “As this may be the end of the road for Tharpe’s juror-bias claim, however, we should not look away from the magnitude of the potential injustice that procedural barriers are shielding from judicial review,” Sotomayer wrote. “Tharpe has uncovered truly striking evidence of juror bias.” The justice later added: “It may be tempting to dismiss Tharpe’s case as an outlier, but racial bias is ‘a familiar and recurring evil.’”
by Lauren Floyd
Daily Kos
January 26, 2020
A Georgia inmate died Friday, Jan. 24 after spending years fighting the jury decision that landed him on death row after he argued a racist juror negatively impacted his case, according to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Keith “Bo” Tharpe died at 61-years-old at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison of what the organization representing him reported were likely complications resulting from cancer. His case had earlier went before the U.S. Supreme Court leading to a stay of his execution after what was planned to be his last meal Sept. 26, 2017, the AJC reported.
Although Tharpe was sentenced in the death of his sister-in-law Jaquelin Freeman in 1991, the exposure of juror Barney Gattie’s multiple racist comments seven years later brought new light to the case. “After studying the Bible, I have wondered if black people even have souls, ” Gattie said in a signed affidavit cited in a Supreme Court decision. The racist also called Tharpe the n-word in the affidavit. “There are two types of black people: 1. Black folks and 2. N----rs,” he said.
Gattie added that Tharpe, “‘who wasn’t in the ‘good’ black folks category in [his] book, should get the electric chair for what he did.” Still, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied Tharpe’s appeal of the verdict after concluding “he had not made an adequate showing that Gattie’s racial bias affected the jury’s verdict.” Although the Supreme Court disagreed with that decision and sent the case to an appeals court, Tharpe was unsuccessful in his appeal due in part to a procedural flaw the state of Georgia prompted.
Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor said in the writ decision: “Before this Court, Tharpe argues that he could not have raised his racial-bias claim in a motion for new trial or on direct appeal because he did not know—indeed, could not have known—of the predicate facts of the claim at that time… If preserved, that argument would have force. But Tharpe did not make this argument before the District Court until a footnote in his reply brief in the Federal Rule of Civil Procedure...” Therefore, an appeals court was forced to limit its consideration only to a claim Tharpe made that he had ineffective assistance, which didn’t lead to an overturned verdict for Tharpe. The Supreme Court ultimately chose not to hear Tharpe’s appeal, according to the court decision. “As this may be the end of the road for Tharpe’s juror-bias claim, however, we should not look away from the magnitude of the potential injustice that procedural barriers are shielding from judicial review,” Sotomayer wrote. “Tharpe has uncovered truly striking evidence of juror bias.” The justice later added: “It may be tempting to dismiss Tharpe’s case as an outlier, but racial bias is ‘a familiar and recurring evil.’”
WILL SOMEONE PLEASE SEND GEORGE TAKEI BACK INTO OUTER SPACE AND LEAVE HIM THERE!
Star Trek Actor George Takei Thinks He’s Entitled to Royalties for the Space Force Logo
By Matt Margolis
PJ Media
January 25, 2020
George Takei has been suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome for a long time and has probably spent more time in the past few years criticizing Trump than breathing. Nothing is too petty for Takei to gripe about when it comes to Trump. When Trump announced the new logo for the U.S. Space Force, it was inevitable that the has-been actor, mostly known for his portrayal of Lieutenant Sulu on Star Trek: The Original Series, would have an opinion.
Many people quickly noticed the similarities between the new Space Force logo and the logo of the fictional Starfleet Command from the Star Trek universe.
But, the insufferable George Takei’s criticism reached an extra level of absurd when he suggested that he and others connected to Star Trek were somehow entitled to royalties.
It’s possible that Takei was being tongue-in-cheek with his tweet, but I’m inclined to believe he was being serious. For starters, he’s technically accusing the federal government of trademark infringement, since the logo was created for the Space Force, and not the same as the Starfleet Command logo that has been licensed for use by the federal government. If it were, neither Takei nor any actors involved with Star Trek would not be entitled to any such royalties, as ViacomCBS owns Star Trek, and it would be up to them to make any claims of trademark infringement or claim any monetary compensation or royalties.
But here’s the other problem with George Takei’s accusation. Chris Burns at Slash Gear explains why the logos look similar. “[The Space Force] logo should look familiar. It would very much appear to be a reincarnation of its former self – not to mention a clear reminder of the origins and controversy over the original. And yes, that does very much look like the Star Trek Starfleet Command insignia, largely because all of these symbols are designed to mimic one another – for real.”
Michael Okuda, the longtime graphic designer and lead designer for Star Trek who designed the Starfleet Command seal, noted that his logo “was intended to be somewhat reminiscent of the NASA emblem.”
George Takei knows what NASA is, right?
Seriously though, George Takei could have simply acknowledged the logos as being homages to each other, and maybe even taken some pride in the similarities of the logos, but instead, he decided to use the news to make another silly attack on Trump.
So, no George, you aren’t entitled to any royalties. If you’re that desperate for money, go start a GoFundMe page.
By Matt Margolis
PJ Media
January 25, 2020
George Takei has been suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome for a long time and has probably spent more time in the past few years criticizing Trump than breathing. Nothing is too petty for Takei to gripe about when it comes to Trump. When Trump announced the new logo for the U.S. Space Force, it was inevitable that the has-been actor, mostly known for his portrayal of Lieutenant Sulu on Star Trek: The Original Series, would have an opinion.
Many people quickly noticed the similarities between the new Space Force logo and the logo of the fictional Starfleet Command from the Star Trek universe.
But, the insufferable George Takei’s criticism reached an extra level of absurd when he suggested that he and others connected to Star Trek were somehow entitled to royalties.
It’s possible that Takei was being tongue-in-cheek with his tweet, but I’m inclined to believe he was being serious. For starters, he’s technically accusing the federal government of trademark infringement, since the logo was created for the Space Force, and not the same as the Starfleet Command logo that has been licensed for use by the federal government. If it were, neither Takei nor any actors involved with Star Trek would not be entitled to any such royalties, as ViacomCBS owns Star Trek, and it would be up to them to make any claims of trademark infringement or claim any monetary compensation or royalties.
But here’s the other problem with George Takei’s accusation. Chris Burns at Slash Gear explains why the logos look similar. “[The Space Force] logo should look familiar. It would very much appear to be a reincarnation of its former self – not to mention a clear reminder of the origins and controversy over the original. And yes, that does very much look like the Star Trek Starfleet Command insignia, largely because all of these symbols are designed to mimic one another – for real.”
Michael Okuda, the longtime graphic designer and lead designer for Star Trek who designed the Starfleet Command seal, noted that his logo “was intended to be somewhat reminiscent of the NASA emblem.”
George Takei knows what NASA is, right?
Seriously though, George Takei could have simply acknowledged the logos as being homages to each other, and maybe even taken some pride in the similarities of the logos, but instead, he decided to use the news to make another silly attack on Trump.
So, no George, you aren’t entitled to any royalties. If you’re that desperate for money, go start a GoFundMe page.
BLACK MAGIC HELPS POLICE FIND MISSING GIRL
Kentucky sheriff claims psychics told him he would find missing teen -- and he did
By Robert Gearty
Fox News
January 25, 2020
Psychics told a Kentucky sheriff they had a premonition he would find a missing teen safe -- and they were proven right.
According to a report by Fox News, Franklin County Sheriff Chris Quire asked mediums to help him find 17-year-old Haylee Martin who was reported missing from Frankfort on Jan. 13, a day after disappearing.
She was found Friday in another jurisdiction, Scott County, after police there responded to a burglary call and found her and a friend trying to break into a house belonging to the friend's boyfriend, the Frankfort State Journal reported.
Quire told the paper that he met a group of local psychics on Thursday evening at Haylee's house where she was last seen.
The paper reported that the sheriff was at first skeptical but said he "did not want to leave any stone unturned."
"It's hard to believe, but most (of the psychics) agreed that we would find Haylee in a neighboring county by morning," he said. "And we did."
The girl disappeared after breaking up with a boyfriend, according to deputies.
Quire said two of three adults may face charges for helping Haylee avoid being found, the paper reported.
By Robert Gearty
Fox News
January 25, 2020
Psychics told a Kentucky sheriff they had a premonition he would find a missing teen safe -- and they were proven right.
According to a report by Fox News, Franklin County Sheriff Chris Quire asked mediums to help him find 17-year-old Haylee Martin who was reported missing from Frankfort on Jan. 13, a day after disappearing.
She was found Friday in another jurisdiction, Scott County, after police there responded to a burglary call and found her and a friend trying to break into a house belonging to the friend's boyfriend, the Frankfort State Journal reported.
Quire told the paper that he met a group of local psychics on Thursday evening at Haylee's house where she was last seen.
The paper reported that the sheriff was at first skeptical but said he "did not want to leave any stone unturned."
"It's hard to believe, but most (of the psychics) agreed that we would find Haylee in a neighboring county by morning," he said. "And we did."
The girl disappeared after breaking up with a boyfriend, according to deputies.
Quire said two of three adults may face charges for helping Haylee avoid being found, the paper reported.
Sunday, January 26, 2020
DID THE MOST UNFAIRLY ATTACKED PRESIDENT IN HISTORY COMMIT AN IMPEACHABLE OFFENSE?
In 1970, then House Minority Leader Gerald Ford defined an impeachable offense as: “An impeachable offense is whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history”
By Howie Katz
Big Jolly Times
January 25, 2020
President Trump has been impeached for “Abuse of Power” and Obstruction of Congress.”
The abuse charge resulted from an unidentified whistleblower claiming he was told by another source that Trump was going to withhold military aid to the Ukraine if it did not investigate Joe Biden and his crackhead son Hunter for corruption. The alleged threat was made in a phone call to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky.
The obstruction charge was brought because Trump refused to let administration officials appear before the House committees investigating him.
I have always maintained that Trump has not met the constitutional “treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors” grounds for impeachment. However, by doing some extensive research on impeachment, I found out that I was wrong.
Over the years, Congress has interpreted “high crimes and misdemeanors” to include acts that are not criminal. And in 1970, then House Minority Leader Gerald Ford defined an impeachable offense as: “An impeachable offense is whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history.”
So, let’s assume that Trump did abuse his power and obstruct congress. Do those offenses rise to a level calling for the ouster of the President? I say, no way! No way because Trump has been impeached by the Democrats strictly for political reasons.
Hillary Clinton and the Democrats laughed themselves sick on June 16, 2015, when Trump officially became a candidate for president. They kept laughing and laughing until the night of November 9, 2016, when Hillary, in disbelief, burst into tears upon learning she would not achieve her life-long dream of becoming the first woman president of the United States. The Democratic laughter had finally stopped.
From the time that Trump took office, the Democrats, abetted by a Trump-hating media, have been relentless in attempts to destroy the Trump presidency and to nullify the 2016 election. Trump could hardly take a breath without the media making something ugly of it.
And the impeachment of Trump is a purely political move by Nancy Pelosi, Adam Schiff, Jerry Nadler and the rest of the House Democrats to nullify the election and drive Trump out of office. Failing that, the Demoncrats (oops, typo) hope that the impeachment proceedings will turn the 2020 election into their favor.
While I have to admit that Adam Schitt (oops, another typo) made a compelling case for convicting Trump, I do not think the transgressions he committed rise to the level of ousting the President from office, especially since the impeachment proceedings were nothing more than a partisan political attack on Trump.
The impeachment circus started with a whistleblower's hearsay complaint about the president making an inappropriate phone call. Inappropriate it may have been, but inappropriateness is not what the founding fathers had in mind when they included the impeachment process in the Constitution.
Fortunately for Trump, it will take a two-thirds majority of Senators present to convict him. Currently there are 53 Republican senators, 45 Democratic senators and 2 independents. The independents are expected to join the Democrats in convicting Trump. That means 20 Republican senators would have to join the Democrat in order to reach the 67-vote threshold for conviction … and that ain’t about to happen.
Daily Mail columnist Piers Morgan thinks that when the Senate fails to convict him, Trump will point to it as further ‘evidence’ that he is the most unfairly attacked president in history. And that he is!
By Howie Katz
Big Jolly Times
January 25, 2020
President Trump has been impeached for “Abuse of Power” and Obstruction of Congress.”
The abuse charge resulted from an unidentified whistleblower claiming he was told by another source that Trump was going to withhold military aid to the Ukraine if it did not investigate Joe Biden and his crackhead son Hunter for corruption. The alleged threat was made in a phone call to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky.
The obstruction charge was brought because Trump refused to let administration officials appear before the House committees investigating him.
I have always maintained that Trump has not met the constitutional “treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors” grounds for impeachment. However, by doing some extensive research on impeachment, I found out that I was wrong.
Over the years, Congress has interpreted “high crimes and misdemeanors” to include acts that are not criminal. And in 1970, then House Minority Leader Gerald Ford defined an impeachable offense as: “An impeachable offense is whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history.”
So, let’s assume that Trump did abuse his power and obstruct congress. Do those offenses rise to a level calling for the ouster of the President? I say, no way! No way because Trump has been impeached by the Democrats strictly for political reasons.
Hillary Clinton and the Democrats laughed themselves sick on June 16, 2015, when Trump officially became a candidate for president. They kept laughing and laughing until the night of November 9, 2016, when Hillary, in disbelief, burst into tears upon learning she would not achieve her life-long dream of becoming the first woman president of the United States. The Democratic laughter had finally stopped.
From the time that Trump took office, the Democrats, abetted by a Trump-hating media, have been relentless in attempts to destroy the Trump presidency and to nullify the 2016 election. Trump could hardly take a breath without the media making something ugly of it.
And the impeachment of Trump is a purely political move by Nancy Pelosi, Adam Schiff, Jerry Nadler and the rest of the House Democrats to nullify the election and drive Trump out of office. Failing that, the Demoncrats (oops, typo) hope that the impeachment proceedings will turn the 2020 election into their favor.
While I have to admit that Adam Schitt (oops, another typo) made a compelling case for convicting Trump, I do not think the transgressions he committed rise to the level of ousting the President from office, especially since the impeachment proceedings were nothing more than a partisan political attack on Trump.
The impeachment circus started with a whistleblower's hearsay complaint about the president making an inappropriate phone call. Inappropriate it may have been, but inappropriateness is not what the founding fathers had in mind when they included the impeachment process in the Constitution.
Fortunately for Trump, it will take a two-thirds majority of Senators present to convict him. Currently there are 53 Republican senators, 45 Democratic senators and 2 independents. The independents are expected to join the Democrats in convicting Trump. That means 20 Republican senators would have to join the Democrat in order to reach the 67-vote threshold for conviction … and that ain’t about to happen.
Daily Mail columnist Piers Morgan thinks that when the Senate fails to convict him, Trump will point to it as further ‘evidence’ that he is the most unfairly attacked president in history. And that he is!
SCHITT MADE FULL OF SHIT CLAIM
GOP Senators Incensed by Schiff's 'Head on a Pike' Remark
By Laurie Kellman
Associated Press
January 25, 2020
WASHINGTON -- Senate Republicans said lead impeachment prosecutor Adam Schiff insulted them during the trial by repeating an anonymously sourced report that the White House had threatened to punish Republicans who voted against President Donald Trump.
Schiff, who delivered closing arguments for the prosecution, was holding Republican senators rapt as he called for removing Trump from office for abusing his power and obstructing Congress. Doing anything else, he argued, would be to let the president bully Senate Republicans into ignoring his pressure on Ukraine for political help.
“CBS News reported last night that a Trump confidant said that key senators were warned, 'Vote against the president and your head will be on a pike.' I don't know if that's true,” Schiff said.
After that remark, the generally respectful mood in the Senate immediately changed. Republicans across their side of the chamber groaned, gasped and said, “That's not true.” One of those key moderate Republicans, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, looked directly at Schiff, shook her head and said, “Not true."
“Not only have I never heard the ‘head on the pike’ line," Collins said in a statement, "but also I know of no Republican senator who has been threatened in any way by anyone in the administration.”
It wasn't immediately clear what impact, if any, Schiff's comment would have on upcoming votes on witnesses and the ultimate question of whether Trump should be removed from office. Democrats need support from at least four Republicans to win a vote on calling witnesses, and Schiff's arguments over three days were clearly aimed at persuadable GOP senators.
Hearing the Republican protests, and with an eye toward Collins, Schiff paused and said: “I hope it's not true. I hope it's not true.”
But Republicans were already put off.
“That’s when he lost me,” Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, a Republican moderate, said about Schiff's remark, according to her spokeswoman. She denied having been told what the network reported about the White House. Schiff's invocation of it, she added, ”was unnecessary.”
Collins, another moderate who is up for reelection this year, is one of the few Republican senators who has expressed an openness to calling witnesses in the impeachment trial.
She had been listening intently to Schiff's presentation and writing down some of his points. When he made the “pike” comment, she looked directly at Schiff and slowly and repeatedly shook her head back and forth. When he finished his speech and the trial adjourned, GOP Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and John Barrasso of Wyoming made a beeline for her seat. Collins again shook her head and said, “No.”
Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., told reporters that the CBS report is "completely, totally false."
“None of us have been told that,” he added. "That's insulting and demeaning to everyone to say that we somehow live in fear and that the president has threatened all of us.''
By Laurie Kellman
Associated Press
January 25, 2020
WASHINGTON -- Senate Republicans said lead impeachment prosecutor Adam Schiff insulted them during the trial by repeating an anonymously sourced report that the White House had threatened to punish Republicans who voted against President Donald Trump.
Schiff, who delivered closing arguments for the prosecution, was holding Republican senators rapt as he called for removing Trump from office for abusing his power and obstructing Congress. Doing anything else, he argued, would be to let the president bully Senate Republicans into ignoring his pressure on Ukraine for political help.
“CBS News reported last night that a Trump confidant said that key senators were warned, 'Vote against the president and your head will be on a pike.' I don't know if that's true,” Schiff said.
After that remark, the generally respectful mood in the Senate immediately changed. Republicans across their side of the chamber groaned, gasped and said, “That's not true.” One of those key moderate Republicans, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, looked directly at Schiff, shook her head and said, “Not true."
“Not only have I never heard the ‘head on the pike’ line," Collins said in a statement, "but also I know of no Republican senator who has been threatened in any way by anyone in the administration.”
It wasn't immediately clear what impact, if any, Schiff's comment would have on upcoming votes on witnesses and the ultimate question of whether Trump should be removed from office. Democrats need support from at least four Republicans to win a vote on calling witnesses, and Schiff's arguments over three days were clearly aimed at persuadable GOP senators.
Hearing the Republican protests, and with an eye toward Collins, Schiff paused and said: “I hope it's not true. I hope it's not true.”
But Republicans were already put off.
“That’s when he lost me,” Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, a Republican moderate, said about Schiff's remark, according to her spokeswoman. She denied having been told what the network reported about the White House. Schiff's invocation of it, she added, ”was unnecessary.”
Collins, another moderate who is up for reelection this year, is one of the few Republican senators who has expressed an openness to calling witnesses in the impeachment trial.
She had been listening intently to Schiff's presentation and writing down some of his points. When he made the “pike” comment, she looked directly at Schiff and slowly and repeatedly shook her head back and forth. When he finished his speech and the trial adjourned, GOP Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and John Barrasso of Wyoming made a beeline for her seat. Collins again shook her head and said, “No.”
Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., told reporters that the CBS report is "completely, totally false."
“None of us have been told that,” he added. "That's insulting and demeaning to everyone to say that we somehow live in fear and that the president has threatened all of us.''
MAJOR NEWSPAPER ENDORSES LONG-TERM FRAUD, GENERAL DECEPTION, OBFUSCATION AND STUPIDITY
by Bob Walsh
Yes, the Des Moines Register used to be a well thought of newspaper. It is now relegated to fishwrapper status. Yesterday they endorsed Pocahontas Warren for President. The fact that she engaged in a long-term fraud to gain a place on the Harvard staff as a "native american" minority, can't think of anything convincing to say other than to duck and dodge when asked how to pay for her pie-in-the-sky promises and can not remember that there is a difference between "two cents" and "two percent" does not seem to matter to their editorial board.
No wonder print journalism is in such bad shape. They are as stupid as broadcast media.
EDITOR'S NOTE: The Des Moines Register endorsed Hillary Clinton for president in 2016.
Yes, the Des Moines Register used to be a well thought of newspaper. It is now relegated to fishwrapper status. Yesterday they endorsed Pocahontas Warren for President. The fact that she engaged in a long-term fraud to gain a place on the Harvard staff as a "native american" minority, can't think of anything convincing to say other than to duck and dodge when asked how to pay for her pie-in-the-sky promises and can not remember that there is a difference between "two cents" and "two percent" does not seem to matter to their editorial board.
No wonder print journalism is in such bad shape. They are as stupid as broadcast media.
EDITOR'S NOTE: The Des Moines Register endorsed Hillary Clinton for president in 2016.
DEMAND PRICING IS A BITCH
by Bob Walsh
You are probably aware that there was a modest mass-shooting a few days ago outside a bar in Seattle. Seven people shot, one fatality. It seems that a LOT of people in the area suddenly wanted to get the fuck out of Dodge and hit their Uber and Lyft apps. The sudden increase in demand bumped a $17 dollar ride up to about $122.
That, boys and girls, is capitalism. Allegedly the companies are unsympathetic to accusations of gouging.
FURTHER INFORMATION
After due consideration, Uber and Lyft decided to reverse the "surge" (demand) charges for their customers fleeing the Seattle shooting. Due to the public safety issue and the fact that the cops redirected bus traffic away from the area it made it look like the ride hailing services were profiteering from a public safety event.
You are probably aware that there was a modest mass-shooting a few days ago outside a bar in Seattle. Seven people shot, one fatality. It seems that a LOT of people in the area suddenly wanted to get the fuck out of Dodge and hit their Uber and Lyft apps. The sudden increase in demand bumped a $17 dollar ride up to about $122.
That, boys and girls, is capitalism. Allegedly the companies are unsympathetic to accusations of gouging.
FURTHER INFORMATION
After due consideration, Uber and Lyft decided to reverse the "surge" (demand) charges for their customers fleeing the Seattle shooting. Due to the public safety issue and the fact that the cops redirected bus traffic away from the area it made it look like the ride hailing services were profiteering from a public safety event.
A TEMPEST IN A TEAPOT, FULL OF SOUND AND FURY, SIGNIFYING MASSIVE IRRITATION
by Bob Walsh
An older gentleman kicked the bucket in north Stockton a few days ago of natural causes. When the cops got to his house for a welfare check they called the county bomb disposal unit, who called EOD at Travis AFB, who evacuated most of a neighborhood and closed roads to safely deal with some highly dangerous military grade explosives and ordinance.
After several days they determined that ALL of the stuff was inert collectors items or aftermarket replicas. About 500 pieces in all.
I wonder if that means I should take the fuse bodies out of my hand grenade collection? Wouldn't want to worry anybody if I get run down by a beer wagon.
An older gentleman kicked the bucket in north Stockton a few days ago of natural causes. When the cops got to his house for a welfare check they called the county bomb disposal unit, who called EOD at Travis AFB, who evacuated most of a neighborhood and closed roads to safely deal with some highly dangerous military grade explosives and ordinance.
After several days they determined that ALL of the stuff was inert collectors items or aftermarket replicas. About 500 pieces in all.
I wonder if that means I should take the fuse bodies out of my hand grenade collection? Wouldn't want to worry anybody if I get run down by a beer wagon.
THE BRITISH HAVE A GOOD CASE FOR EXTRADITION AND I THINK WE SHOULD GRANT IT
Harry Dunn: Family will 'never give up' after extradition request denied
Sky News
January 24, 2020
Harry Dunn's mother has told Sky News they were "prepared" for the US to turn down an extradition request for the woman charged over the 19-year-old's death.
Charlotte Charles said the denial by the US State Department to extradite Anna Sacoolas was a "blow" but one that she and Mr Dunn's father Tim Dunn expected.
"We've just got to carry on fighting and we will get there in the end," she told Sky News correspondent Lisa Dowd.
"We'd prepared ourselves for this. We've just got to carry on fighting and we will get there in the end.
"It doesn't matter when, whether it's this administration or the next. The extradition request is always going to be over Anna Sacoolas's head, and we're never going to give up."
Mr Dunn died in a head-on crash with a car on 27 August last year near to RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire.
The driver of the car, Mrs Sacoolas, claimed diplomatic immunity and returned to the US, where she has been since Harry died. Her husband is thought to be a US intelligence officer.
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said: "I called the US Ambassador earlier to express the Government's disappointment about this decision. We feel this amounts to a denial of justice, and we believe Anne Sacoolas should return to the UK.
"We are now urgently considering our options. I also explained that the UK would have acted differently if this had been a UK diplomat serving in the US."
A State Department spokesperson said: "At the time the accident occurred, and for the duration of her stay in the UK, the US citizen driver in this case had immunity from criminal jurisdiction.
"If the United States were to grant the UK's extradition request, it would render the invocation of diplomatic immunity a practical nullity and would set an extraordinarily troubling precedent.
"The United States has a history of close law enforcement cooperation with the United Kingdom, and we value that relationship.
"The United States government again expresses its sincere condolences and sympathy to the Dunn family for the loss of their son."
Mrs Sacoolas, 42, was charged with causing his death by dangerous driving, by the Crown Prosecution Service in December.
Lawyers acting on behalf of the Dunn family have said it is the first time in the 100-year history of the extradition treaty that such a request had been turned down by the US.
However, Boris Johnson has previously described the chances of America handing over Mrs Sacoolas as "very low".
Spokesman for the Dunns, Radd Seiger, said the family's constituency MP Andrea Leadsom had called him on Thursday evening to inform him of Mr Pompeo's decision.
He told Sky News: "She told me an email had dropped in to the government this evening from Secretary Pompeo declining the extradition request.
"It was not a surprise and there was no reason given."
Mr Seiger continued: "This changes absolutely nothing, we completely factored in this development into our planning - we knew it was coming all along. Secretary Pompeo made his position clear right from the start that she was never going back."
Ms Leadsom is due to meet the US ambassador Woody Johnson in London on Friday to discuss the case.
The decision comes after the commander of a US military base, Colonel Bridget McNamara of RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire, said all staff must take a "driver safety course" and pass a written exam based on UK driving laws.
At the weekend, police revealed that diplomatic cars were driven on the wrong side of the road in two separate incidents near the base.
Footage has emerged of one of the incidents, showing a blue BMW involved in a near-miss.
The base, which is used as a communications station for the US Air Force, has come under scrutiny since Mr Dunn's death.
In reaction to the statement from Col McNamara, Mr Dunn's family said it was the first time they had heard from the colonel for five months.
Mr Seiger said the base had a "blatant disregard for the safety of the community" and said their statement was "the opposite of the truth".
Sky News
January 24, 2020
Harry Dunn's mother has told Sky News they were "prepared" for the US to turn down an extradition request for the woman charged over the 19-year-old's death.
Charlotte Charles said the denial by the US State Department to extradite Anna Sacoolas was a "blow" but one that she and Mr Dunn's father Tim Dunn expected.
"We've just got to carry on fighting and we will get there in the end," she told Sky News correspondent Lisa Dowd.
"We'd prepared ourselves for this. We've just got to carry on fighting and we will get there in the end.
"It doesn't matter when, whether it's this administration or the next. The extradition request is always going to be over Anna Sacoolas's head, and we're never going to give up."
Mr Dunn died in a head-on crash with a car on 27 August last year near to RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire.
The driver of the car, Mrs Sacoolas, claimed diplomatic immunity and returned to the US, where she has been since Harry died. Her husband is thought to be a US intelligence officer.
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said: "I called the US Ambassador earlier to express the Government's disappointment about this decision. We feel this amounts to a denial of justice, and we believe Anne Sacoolas should return to the UK.
"We are now urgently considering our options. I also explained that the UK would have acted differently if this had been a UK diplomat serving in the US."
A State Department spokesperson said: "At the time the accident occurred, and for the duration of her stay in the UK, the US citizen driver in this case had immunity from criminal jurisdiction.
"If the United States were to grant the UK's extradition request, it would render the invocation of diplomatic immunity a practical nullity and would set an extraordinarily troubling precedent.
"The United States has a history of close law enforcement cooperation with the United Kingdom, and we value that relationship.
"The United States government again expresses its sincere condolences and sympathy to the Dunn family for the loss of their son."
Mrs Sacoolas, 42, was charged with causing his death by dangerous driving, by the Crown Prosecution Service in December.
Lawyers acting on behalf of the Dunn family have said it is the first time in the 100-year history of the extradition treaty that such a request had been turned down by the US.
However, Boris Johnson has previously described the chances of America handing over Mrs Sacoolas as "very low".
Spokesman for the Dunns, Radd Seiger, said the family's constituency MP Andrea Leadsom had called him on Thursday evening to inform him of Mr Pompeo's decision.
He told Sky News: "She told me an email had dropped in to the government this evening from Secretary Pompeo declining the extradition request.
"It was not a surprise and there was no reason given."
Mr Seiger continued: "This changes absolutely nothing, we completely factored in this development into our planning - we knew it was coming all along. Secretary Pompeo made his position clear right from the start that she was never going back."
Ms Leadsom is due to meet the US ambassador Woody Johnson in London on Friday to discuss the case.
The decision comes after the commander of a US military base, Colonel Bridget McNamara of RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire, said all staff must take a "driver safety course" and pass a written exam based on UK driving laws.
At the weekend, police revealed that diplomatic cars were driven on the wrong side of the road in two separate incidents near the base.
Footage has emerged of one of the incidents, showing a blue BMW involved in a near-miss.
The base, which is used as a communications station for the US Air Force, has come under scrutiny since Mr Dunn's death.
In reaction to the statement from Col McNamara, Mr Dunn's family said it was the first time they had heard from the colonel for five months.
Mr Seiger said the base had a "blatant disregard for the safety of the community" and said their statement was "the opposite of the truth".
MOVING HIM FROM NY TO NJ COULD BE CONSIDERED PUNISHMENT
Jeffrey Epstein’s prison warden moving to leadership role at New Jersey facility: report
By Sara Dorn
New Yrk Post
January 25, 2020
The federal prison warden in charge when Jeffrey Epstein killed himself will soon oversee inmates again — just 6 months after Attorney General William Barr reassigned him to a desk post amid probes into the pedophile’s suspicious death, according to a new report.
Lamine N’Diaye will begin his new leadership role at FCI Fort Dix, a low-security prison in Burlington County, New Jersey, on Feb. 2, sources told The Associated Press. It’s unclear why he will again be tasked with supervising inmates after Epstein’s stunning death riled top justice department officials and ended the child sex abuse case against him.
N’Diaye’s guards at the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Metropolitan Correctional Center, Tova Noel and Michael Thomas, are accused of failing to check on Epstein every half hour as required and falsifying reports to show they had. Instead, they browsed the web and napped while Epstein hung himself just 15 feet away, according to prosecutors.
Noel and Thomas are each criminally charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States and with producing false records.
Epstein’s Aug. 10 death sparked conspiracy theories and revealed chronic mismanagement, including severe understaffing, at the Manhattan prison.
Barr reassigned N’Diaye to a regional office desk post less than two weeks later and removed the acting director of the Bureau of Prisons, Hugh Hurwitz.
By Sara Dorn
New Yrk Post
January 25, 2020
The federal prison warden in charge when Jeffrey Epstein killed himself will soon oversee inmates again — just 6 months after Attorney General William Barr reassigned him to a desk post amid probes into the pedophile’s suspicious death, according to a new report.
Lamine N’Diaye will begin his new leadership role at FCI Fort Dix, a low-security prison in Burlington County, New Jersey, on Feb. 2, sources told The Associated Press. It’s unclear why he will again be tasked with supervising inmates after Epstein’s stunning death riled top justice department officials and ended the child sex abuse case against him.
N’Diaye’s guards at the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Metropolitan Correctional Center, Tova Noel and Michael Thomas, are accused of failing to check on Epstein every half hour as required and falsifying reports to show they had. Instead, they browsed the web and napped while Epstein hung himself just 15 feet away, according to prosecutors.
Noel and Thomas are each criminally charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States and with producing false records.
Epstein’s Aug. 10 death sparked conspiracy theories and revealed chronic mismanagement, including severe understaffing, at the Manhattan prison.
Barr reassigned N’Diaye to a regional office desk post less than two weeks later and removed the acting director of the Bureau of Prisons, Hugh Hurwitz.
WHAT IF THE SKELETON HAD BEEN REAL?
Man cited for using fake skeleton to drive in HOV lane
Associated Press
January 25, 2020
PHOENIX -- A 62-year-old man was cited in Arizona this week after trying to disguise a fake skeleton as a passenger just to use the HOV lane.
The Arizona Department of Public Safety says a trooper pulled over the man on Thursday after noticing he had placed a fake skeleton in the passenger’s front seat.
The skeleton was sitting upright, wearing a hat and tied to the front seat.
Department spokesman Raul Garcia said troopers cite about 7,000 HOV lane violators every year. Last April, a man was pulled over after driving in the HOV lane with a mannequin wearing a sweatshirt, baseball cap and sunglasses.
Associated Press
January 25, 2020
PHOENIX -- A 62-year-old man was cited in Arizona this week after trying to disguise a fake skeleton as a passenger just to use the HOV lane.
The Arizona Department of Public Safety says a trooper pulled over the man on Thursday after noticing he had placed a fake skeleton in the passenger’s front seat.
The skeleton was sitting upright, wearing a hat and tied to the front seat.
Department spokesman Raul Garcia said troopers cite about 7,000 HOV lane violators every year. Last April, a man was pulled over after driving in the HOV lane with a mannequin wearing a sweatshirt, baseball cap and sunglasses.
THE SPEECHES OF MIKE PENCE AND VLADIMIR PUTIN AT THE 5TH WORLD HOLOAUST FORUM IN JERUSALEM ON JANUARY 23
Here is the full text of US Vice President Mike Pence's speech at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum
"President Rivlin, Prime Minister Netanyahu, Your Majesties, Presidents, Excellencies, honored survivors and distinguished guests: It is deeply humbling for me to stand before you today, on behalf of the American people, as we mark the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.
"On this occasion, here on Mount Herzl, we gather to fulfill a solemn obligation – an obligation of remembrance: to never allow the memory of those who died in the Holocaust to be forgotten by anyone, anywhere in the world.
"The word 'remember' appears no fewer than 169 times in the Hebrew Bible – for memory is the constant obligation of all generations.
"And today we pause to remember what President Donald Trump rightly called the "dark stain on human history" – the greatest evil ever perpetuated by man against man in the long catalogue of human crime.
"The faces of a million and a half children reduced to smoke under a silent sky for the crime of having a single Jewish grandparent. The night Elie Wiesel called "seven times sealed" consumed the faith of so many then, and challenges the faith of so many still.
"Today we remember what happens when the powerless cry for help and the powerful refuse to answer.
"The town’s name was Oswiecim. As part of their plan to destroy the very existence of Polish culture, the Nazis gave Polish towns German names. And this one they called Auschwitz.
"When soldiers opened the gates of Auschwitz on January 27, 1945, they found 7,000 half-starved, half-naked prisoners, hundreds of boxes of camp records that documented the greatest mass murder in history. Before the war was over, in its five years of existence, more than 1.1 million men, women, and children would perish at Auschwitz.
"As my wife and I can attest firsthand, from this past year, one cannot walk the grounds of Auschwitz without being overcome with emotion and grief. One cannot see the piles of shoes, the gas chambers, the crematoriums, the lone boxcar facing the gate to the camp, and those grainy photographs of men, women, and children being sent to their deaths without asking: "How could they?"
"Today we mourn with those who mourn and grieve with those who grieve. We remember the names and the faces and the promise of the six million Jews who were murdered in the Holocaust.
"Today we also pay tribute to those who survived, who all these years have borne witness to that evil and have served mankind by their example.
"And today we honor and remember the memory of all the Allied forces, including more than 2 million American soldiers, who left hearth and home, suffered appalling casualties, and freed a continent from the grip of tyranny.
"And, finally, we pay tribute to the memory of those non-Jewish heroes who saved countless lives – those the people of Israel call the "righteous among the nations."
"In an age of indifference, they acted. In an age of fear, they showed courage. And their memory and their example should kindle anew the flame of our hearts to do the same in our time.
"We must be prepared to stand as they did against the wave of their times. We must be prepared to confront and expose the vile tide of anti-Semitism that is fueling hate and violence all across the world. And we must stand together.
"In that same spirit, we must also stand strong against the leading state purveyor of anti-Semitism, against the one government in the world that denies the Holocaust as a matter of state policy and threatens to wipe Israel off the map. The world must stand strong against the Islamic Republic of Iran.
"And, finally, we must have the courage to recognize all the leaders and all the nations that are gathered here that, today, we have the responsibility and the power to ensure that what we remember here today can never happen again.
"Mr. Prime Minister, as we honor and remember the 6 million Jewish martyrs of the Holocaust, the world can only marvel at the faith and resilience of the Jewish people, who just three years after walking in the valley of the shadow of death, rose up from the ashes to reclaim a Jewish future and rebuild the Jewish State.
"And I’m proud to say, as Vice President of the United States, that the American people have been with you every step of the way since 1948. And so we will remain.
"As President Trump declared in his historic visit to Jerusalem, the bond between our two peoples is 'woven together in the fabric of our hearts.' And so it shall always be.
"Today we remember not simply the liberation of Auschwitz but also the triumph of freedom – a promise fulfilled, a people restored to their rightful place among the nations of the Earth. And we remember – we remember the long night of that past, the survivors and the faces of those we lost, the heroes who stood against those evil times. And today we gather nearly 50 nations strong, here in Jerusalem, to say with one voice: Never again.
"Through pogroms, persecutions, and expulsions in the ghettos, and finally, even though the death camps, the Jewish people clung to an ancient promise that He would 'never leave you or forsake you' and that he would leave this person to inherit the land that he swore to your ancestors that he would give them.
"And so, today, as we bear witness to the strength and the resilience and the faith of the Jewish people, so too we bear witness to God’s faithfulness to the Jewish people.
"May the memory of the martyrs be enshrined in the hearts of all humanity for all time.
"May God bless the Jewish people, the State of Israel, the United States, and all the nations gathered here.
"And may he who creates peace in the heavens create peace for us and for all the world.
"Oseh shalom bimromav. Hu ya’aseh shalom aleinu. V’al kol Yisrael V’imru. Amen."
__________
Here is the full text of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s speech at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum
"Mr. President, Mr. Prime Minister, colleagues, friends, ladies and gentlemen.
"Today we are brought together at the international forum to honor the victims of the Holocaust by a shared responsibility, our duty to the past and the future.
"We mourn all the victims of the Nazis, including the six million Jews tortured in ghettos and death camps and killed cruelly during raids. Forty percent of them were citizens of the Soviet Union, so the Holocaust has always been a deep wound for us, a tragedy we will always remember.
"Before visiting Jerusalem, I looked through original documents, reports by Red Army officers after the liberation of Auschwitz. I must tell you, colleagues, it is very difficult, unbearable to read these military reports, documents describing in detail how the camp was set up, how the cold-blooded killing machine worked.
"Many of them were hand-written by soldiers and officers of the Red Army on the second or third day after the liberation of the prisoners and convey the shock that the Red Army soldiers and officers experienced from what they saw there, from testimonies that caused pain, indignation and compassion.
"Red Army Field Marshal Konev, who then led the military operation to capture the densely populated Silesian industrial region of Germany, used tactics to spare as many civilians as possible and, having received a report about the atrocities committed at Auschwitz, forbade himself from even seeing this camp. Later he wrote in his memoirs that he had no right to lose his moral strength so that a fair sense of revenge would not have blinded him during military operations and would not have caused additional suffering and casualties among the civilian population of Germany.
"Jan. 27 marks the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. In this hell, where people from different countries were brought for torture, monstrous experiments and mass killing, hundreds of thousands of people of different ethnicities died. More than half of them were Jews.
"The crimes committed by the Nazis, their deliberate, planned, and as they said, 'final solution to the Jewish issue,' is one of the darkest and most shameful pages of modern world history.
"But we should not forget that this crime also had accomplices. They were often crueler than their masters. Death factories and concentration camps were served not only by the Nazis, but also by their accomplices in many European countries.
"In the occupied territories of the Soviet Union, where these criminals were operating, the largest number of Jews were killed. Thus, about 1.4 million Jews were killed in Ukraine, and 220,000 people were killed in Lithuania. I draw your attention, friends, to the fact that this is 95 percent of the pre-war Jewish population of this country. In Latvia, 77,000 Jewish people were killed. Only a few hundred Latvian Jews survived the Holocaust.
"The Holocaust was a deliberate annihilation of [a] people. But we must remember that the Nazis intended the same fate for many other peoples. Russians, Belarusians, Ukrainians, Poles and many other peoples were declared Untermensch. Their land was meant to serve as living space for the Nazis, providing for their prosperous existence, while the Slavs and other peoples were meant either to be exterminated or to become slaves without rights, culture, historical memory, and language.
"Back in 1945, it was first of all the Soviet people who put an end to these barbaric plans. As it has just been said, they protected their Fatherland and liberated Europe from Nazism. We paid a price no nation could even imagine in their worst dreams: a toll of 27 million deaths.
"We will never forget this. The memory of the Holocaust will serve as a lesson and a warning only if it remains fully intact, without any omissions. Unfortunately, today the memory of war and its lessons and legacy often fall subject to the immediate political situation. This is completely unacceptable. It is the duty of current and future politicians, state and public figures to protect the good name of the living and fallen heroes, civilians, and victims of the Nazis and their allies.
"We must use everything we have – our informational, political and cultural capabilities as well as the reputation and influence our countries have in the world – to this end. I am sure that everyone present here today, in this audience, shares these concerns and is ready to protect truth and justice together with us.
"We are all responsible for making sure that the terrible tragedies of this war will not happen again, that the generations to come will remember the horrors of the Holocaust, the death camps and the siege of Leningrad – Prime Minister Netanyahu has just said that today a monument to the victims of the siege was unveiled here in Jerusalem – Babi Yar, and the burned-down village of Khatyn, remember that we must remain alert and must not overlook when the first seeds of hate, chauvinism, and antisemitism take root, or when people start to indulge in xenophobia or other similar manifestations.
"Destruction of the past and lack of unity in the face of threats can lead to terrible consequences. We must have the courage to be straight about this and do everything to defend peace.
"I think an example could and should be set by the founding countries of the United Nations, the five powers that bear special responsibility for the preservation of civilization.
"We have discussed this with several of our colleagues and, as far as I know, have received a generally positive response to holding a meeting of the heads of state of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council: Russia, China, the United States, France, and Britain. We can hold it in any country, in any place that our colleagues would find convenient. Russia is ready for such a serious discussion. We intend to send this proposal to the leaders of the Five without delay.
"We are faced with many challenges. We discussed one of them recently at the initiative of German Chancellor Angela Merkel. This is about Libya. But we will have to return to this issue at the Security Council and adopt a relevant resolution.
"There are many other problems as well. I consider it important and symbolic to hold the proposed meeting this year. After all, we are celebrating 75 years since the end of World War II and the foundation of the United Nations.
"A summit of the states that made the main contribution to the routing of the aggressor and the formation of the postwar world order can play a big role in searching for collective ways of responding to current challenges and threats and would demonstrate our common commitment to the spirit of allied relations, historical memory and the lofty ideals and values for which our predecessors, our grandfathers, and fathers fought shoulder to shoulder.
"In conclusion, I would like to thank our Israeli colleagues for a warm, very hospitable reception here in Jerusalem, and to wish peace, prosperity and all the best to everyone at the conference, and, of course, to the citizens of Israel.
"Thank you."
EDITOR’S NOTE: Putin brought up a good point when he mentioned the fact that many people in the countries occupied by the Nazis collaborated with the Nazis in the slaughter of Jews.
"President Rivlin, Prime Minister Netanyahu, Your Majesties, Presidents, Excellencies, honored survivors and distinguished guests: It is deeply humbling for me to stand before you today, on behalf of the American people, as we mark the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.
"On this occasion, here on Mount Herzl, we gather to fulfill a solemn obligation – an obligation of remembrance: to never allow the memory of those who died in the Holocaust to be forgotten by anyone, anywhere in the world.
"The word 'remember' appears no fewer than 169 times in the Hebrew Bible – for memory is the constant obligation of all generations.
"And today we pause to remember what President Donald Trump rightly called the "dark stain on human history" – the greatest evil ever perpetuated by man against man in the long catalogue of human crime.
"The faces of a million and a half children reduced to smoke under a silent sky for the crime of having a single Jewish grandparent. The night Elie Wiesel called "seven times sealed" consumed the faith of so many then, and challenges the faith of so many still.
"Today we remember what happens when the powerless cry for help and the powerful refuse to answer.
"The town’s name was Oswiecim. As part of their plan to destroy the very existence of Polish culture, the Nazis gave Polish towns German names. And this one they called Auschwitz.
"When soldiers opened the gates of Auschwitz on January 27, 1945, they found 7,000 half-starved, half-naked prisoners, hundreds of boxes of camp records that documented the greatest mass murder in history. Before the war was over, in its five years of existence, more than 1.1 million men, women, and children would perish at Auschwitz.
"As my wife and I can attest firsthand, from this past year, one cannot walk the grounds of Auschwitz without being overcome with emotion and grief. One cannot see the piles of shoes, the gas chambers, the crematoriums, the lone boxcar facing the gate to the camp, and those grainy photographs of men, women, and children being sent to their deaths without asking: "How could they?"
"Today we mourn with those who mourn and grieve with those who grieve. We remember the names and the faces and the promise of the six million Jews who were murdered in the Holocaust.
"Today we also pay tribute to those who survived, who all these years have borne witness to that evil and have served mankind by their example.
"And today we honor and remember the memory of all the Allied forces, including more than 2 million American soldiers, who left hearth and home, suffered appalling casualties, and freed a continent from the grip of tyranny.
"And, finally, we pay tribute to the memory of those non-Jewish heroes who saved countless lives – those the people of Israel call the "righteous among the nations."
"In an age of indifference, they acted. In an age of fear, they showed courage. And their memory and their example should kindle anew the flame of our hearts to do the same in our time.
"We must be prepared to stand as they did against the wave of their times. We must be prepared to confront and expose the vile tide of anti-Semitism that is fueling hate and violence all across the world. And we must stand together.
"In that same spirit, we must also stand strong against the leading state purveyor of anti-Semitism, against the one government in the world that denies the Holocaust as a matter of state policy and threatens to wipe Israel off the map. The world must stand strong against the Islamic Republic of Iran.
"And, finally, we must have the courage to recognize all the leaders and all the nations that are gathered here that, today, we have the responsibility and the power to ensure that what we remember here today can never happen again.
"Mr. Prime Minister, as we honor and remember the 6 million Jewish martyrs of the Holocaust, the world can only marvel at the faith and resilience of the Jewish people, who just three years after walking in the valley of the shadow of death, rose up from the ashes to reclaim a Jewish future and rebuild the Jewish State.
"And I’m proud to say, as Vice President of the United States, that the American people have been with you every step of the way since 1948. And so we will remain.
"As President Trump declared in his historic visit to Jerusalem, the bond between our two peoples is 'woven together in the fabric of our hearts.' And so it shall always be.
"Today we remember not simply the liberation of Auschwitz but also the triumph of freedom – a promise fulfilled, a people restored to their rightful place among the nations of the Earth. And we remember – we remember the long night of that past, the survivors and the faces of those we lost, the heroes who stood against those evil times. And today we gather nearly 50 nations strong, here in Jerusalem, to say with one voice: Never again.
"Through pogroms, persecutions, and expulsions in the ghettos, and finally, even though the death camps, the Jewish people clung to an ancient promise that He would 'never leave you or forsake you' and that he would leave this person to inherit the land that he swore to your ancestors that he would give them.
"And so, today, as we bear witness to the strength and the resilience and the faith of the Jewish people, so too we bear witness to God’s faithfulness to the Jewish people.
"May the memory of the martyrs be enshrined in the hearts of all humanity for all time.
"May God bless the Jewish people, the State of Israel, the United States, and all the nations gathered here.
"And may he who creates peace in the heavens create peace for us and for all the world.
"Oseh shalom bimromav. Hu ya’aseh shalom aleinu. V’al kol Yisrael V’imru. Amen."
__________
Here is the full text of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s speech at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum
"Mr. President, Mr. Prime Minister, colleagues, friends, ladies and gentlemen.
"Today we are brought together at the international forum to honor the victims of the Holocaust by a shared responsibility, our duty to the past and the future.
"We mourn all the victims of the Nazis, including the six million Jews tortured in ghettos and death camps and killed cruelly during raids. Forty percent of them were citizens of the Soviet Union, so the Holocaust has always been a deep wound for us, a tragedy we will always remember.
"Before visiting Jerusalem, I looked through original documents, reports by Red Army officers after the liberation of Auschwitz. I must tell you, colleagues, it is very difficult, unbearable to read these military reports, documents describing in detail how the camp was set up, how the cold-blooded killing machine worked.
"Many of them were hand-written by soldiers and officers of the Red Army on the second or third day after the liberation of the prisoners and convey the shock that the Red Army soldiers and officers experienced from what they saw there, from testimonies that caused pain, indignation and compassion.
"Red Army Field Marshal Konev, who then led the military operation to capture the densely populated Silesian industrial region of Germany, used tactics to spare as many civilians as possible and, having received a report about the atrocities committed at Auschwitz, forbade himself from even seeing this camp. Later he wrote in his memoirs that he had no right to lose his moral strength so that a fair sense of revenge would not have blinded him during military operations and would not have caused additional suffering and casualties among the civilian population of Germany.
"Jan. 27 marks the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. In this hell, where people from different countries were brought for torture, monstrous experiments and mass killing, hundreds of thousands of people of different ethnicities died. More than half of them were Jews.
"The crimes committed by the Nazis, their deliberate, planned, and as they said, 'final solution to the Jewish issue,' is one of the darkest and most shameful pages of modern world history.
"But we should not forget that this crime also had accomplices. They were often crueler than their masters. Death factories and concentration camps were served not only by the Nazis, but also by their accomplices in many European countries.
"In the occupied territories of the Soviet Union, where these criminals were operating, the largest number of Jews were killed. Thus, about 1.4 million Jews were killed in Ukraine, and 220,000 people were killed in Lithuania. I draw your attention, friends, to the fact that this is 95 percent of the pre-war Jewish population of this country. In Latvia, 77,000 Jewish people were killed. Only a few hundred Latvian Jews survived the Holocaust.
"The Holocaust was a deliberate annihilation of [a] people. But we must remember that the Nazis intended the same fate for many other peoples. Russians, Belarusians, Ukrainians, Poles and many other peoples were declared Untermensch. Their land was meant to serve as living space for the Nazis, providing for their prosperous existence, while the Slavs and other peoples were meant either to be exterminated or to become slaves without rights, culture, historical memory, and language.
"Back in 1945, it was first of all the Soviet people who put an end to these barbaric plans. As it has just been said, they protected their Fatherland and liberated Europe from Nazism. We paid a price no nation could even imagine in their worst dreams: a toll of 27 million deaths.
"We will never forget this. The memory of the Holocaust will serve as a lesson and a warning only if it remains fully intact, without any omissions. Unfortunately, today the memory of war and its lessons and legacy often fall subject to the immediate political situation. This is completely unacceptable. It is the duty of current and future politicians, state and public figures to protect the good name of the living and fallen heroes, civilians, and victims of the Nazis and their allies.
"We must use everything we have – our informational, political and cultural capabilities as well as the reputation and influence our countries have in the world – to this end. I am sure that everyone present here today, in this audience, shares these concerns and is ready to protect truth and justice together with us.
"We are all responsible for making sure that the terrible tragedies of this war will not happen again, that the generations to come will remember the horrors of the Holocaust, the death camps and the siege of Leningrad – Prime Minister Netanyahu has just said that today a monument to the victims of the siege was unveiled here in Jerusalem – Babi Yar, and the burned-down village of Khatyn, remember that we must remain alert and must not overlook when the first seeds of hate, chauvinism, and antisemitism take root, or when people start to indulge in xenophobia or other similar manifestations.
"Destruction of the past and lack of unity in the face of threats can lead to terrible consequences. We must have the courage to be straight about this and do everything to defend peace.
"I think an example could and should be set by the founding countries of the United Nations, the five powers that bear special responsibility for the preservation of civilization.
"We have discussed this with several of our colleagues and, as far as I know, have received a generally positive response to holding a meeting of the heads of state of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council: Russia, China, the United States, France, and Britain. We can hold it in any country, in any place that our colleagues would find convenient. Russia is ready for such a serious discussion. We intend to send this proposal to the leaders of the Five without delay.
"We are faced with many challenges. We discussed one of them recently at the initiative of German Chancellor Angela Merkel. This is about Libya. But we will have to return to this issue at the Security Council and adopt a relevant resolution.
"There are many other problems as well. I consider it important and symbolic to hold the proposed meeting this year. After all, we are celebrating 75 years since the end of World War II and the foundation of the United Nations.
"A summit of the states that made the main contribution to the routing of the aggressor and the formation of the postwar world order can play a big role in searching for collective ways of responding to current challenges and threats and would demonstrate our common commitment to the spirit of allied relations, historical memory and the lofty ideals and values for which our predecessors, our grandfathers, and fathers fought shoulder to shoulder.
"In conclusion, I would like to thank our Israeli colleagues for a warm, very hospitable reception here in Jerusalem, and to wish peace, prosperity and all the best to everyone at the conference, and, of course, to the citizens of Israel.
"Thank you."
EDITOR’S NOTE: Putin brought up a good point when he mentioned the fact that many people in the countries occupied by the Nazis collaborated with the Nazis in the slaughter of Jews.
Saturday, January 25, 2020
‘AN ENEMY OF ISRAEL IS AN ENEMY OF TEXAS’
While kings and presidents came to get their pictures taken at the World Holocaust Forum, Texas Governor Greg Abbott offered genuine support
By Ryan Jones
Israel Today
January 24, 2020
We all know that one simply doesn’t mess with Texas.
Texas is now warning that anyone who messes with the Jewish state will likewise earn the ire of the Lone Star State.
Practical support beats photo-ops
While the visiting kings and presidents of the Western world were busy trying to be seen ahead of this week’s Holocaust commemoration event, Texas Governor Greg Abbott quietly visited a week earlier to show his support for Israel in a much more practical way.
The primary reason for Abbott’s visit was to scout for new Israeli technology for Texas to either invest in or purchase.
The trip was facilitated by Start-Up Nation Central, a local non-profit that exists to connect Israeli innovations with the people and regions that need them most.
Texas is already one of Israel’s biggest trade partners, and vice versa, and Abbott vowed that would continue.
“There is a connection between business in Israel and Texas that make both Israel and Texas far better,” he told the gathering in Tel Aviv.
Mess with Israel, you mess with Texas
Later, Abbott came up to Jerusalem, where he was honored with the “Friends of Zion Award” by the Friends of Zion Heritage Center.
In his acceptance speech, Abbott firmly planted his state’s flag of support for Israel.
“There are strong relations between Texas and Israel,” said the governor. “Anybody who is an enemy of Israel is an enemy of Texas. Whenever anybody threatens Israel, we come side by side with Israel to support Israel in any way we can.”
EDITOR’S NOTE: Mahmoud Abbas and his cronies at Fatah better be careful or Governor Greg is liable to send a handful of Texas Rangers to clean house.
By Ryan Jones
Israel Today
January 24, 2020
We all know that one simply doesn’t mess with Texas.
Texas is now warning that anyone who messes with the Jewish state will likewise earn the ire of the Lone Star State.
Practical support beats photo-ops
While the visiting kings and presidents of the Western world were busy trying to be seen ahead of this week’s Holocaust commemoration event, Texas Governor Greg Abbott quietly visited a week earlier to show his support for Israel in a much more practical way.
The primary reason for Abbott’s visit was to scout for new Israeli technology for Texas to either invest in or purchase.
The trip was facilitated by Start-Up Nation Central, a local non-profit that exists to connect Israeli innovations with the people and regions that need them most.
Texas is already one of Israel’s biggest trade partners, and vice versa, and Abbott vowed that would continue.
“There is a connection between business in Israel and Texas that make both Israel and Texas far better,” he told the gathering in Tel Aviv.
Mess with Israel, you mess with Texas
Later, Abbott came up to Jerusalem, where he was honored with the “Friends of Zion Award” by the Friends of Zion Heritage Center.
In his acceptance speech, Abbott firmly planted his state’s flag of support for Israel.
“There are strong relations between Texas and Israel,” said the governor. “Anybody who is an enemy of Israel is an enemy of Texas. Whenever anybody threatens Israel, we come side by side with Israel to support Israel in any way we can.”
EDITOR’S NOTE: Mahmoud Abbas and his cronies at Fatah better be careful or Governor Greg is liable to send a handful of Texas Rangers to clean house.
TRUMP BELIEVES CONCUSSIONS ARE ‘NOT VERY SERIOUS’
Pentagon reveals 34 US troops suffered traumatic brain injuries in Iran's missile attack
By Ryan Pickrell
Business Insider
January 24, 2020
The Department of Defense told reporters Friday that nearly three dozen US service members have been diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries in the aftermath of the Iranian missile attack on US forces in Iraq earlier this month, according to multiple reports.
The Pentagon, following repeated questions, revealed Friday that a total of 34 US service members have been diagnosed with concussions and traumatic brain injuries, some of whom were flown to Germany and the US for treatment. (The Pentagon is reportedly using those two terms interchangeably).
The department said that the delays in reporting the TBIs is that these injuries are not always immediately apparent. "Some of these conditions manifest over time, symptoms can get better and get worse. This is a snapshot in time," Pentagon spokesman John Hoffman explained.
A concussion is a type of traumatic brain injury — damage affecting the brain's normal function caused by a sudden blow to the head or the severe shaking of the head and body.
Immediately following the Jan. 8 ballistic missile attack on US and coalition forces at Al Asad Air Base and in Irbil, President Donald Trump proudly announced that "no Americans were harmed."
A little over a week later, US Central Command revealed that there were, in fact, injuries.
"While no U.S. service members were killed in the Jan. 8 Iranian attack on Al Asad Air base, several were treated for concussion symptoms from the blast and are still being assessed," CENTCOM spokesman Capt. Bill Urban explained in a statement.
He said that a total of 11 US service members had to be transported to facilities in Germany and Kuwait for additional screening and treatment.
On Tuesday, Jan. 21, The Washington Post reported that the number was higher, although it did not give a specific number.
When questioned Wednesday about his earlier statement, now known to be inaccurate, Trump downplayed the severity of the injuries, saying they are "not very serious."
"I heard that they had headaches and a couple of other things, but I would say and I can report that it's not very serious," the president told the press in Davos, Switzerland. "I don't consider them very serious injuries relative to other injuries that I've seen."
When an Associated Press reporter asked for more information about these injuries on Jan. 23, a CENTCOM spokesman told him they'll no longer "play this game."
EDITOR’S NOTE: I think Trump is downplaying the seriousness of brain injuries because he does not want to carry out his threat to punish Iran if they cause any harm to Americans. Either that, or he is an ignoramus.
By Ryan Pickrell
Business Insider
January 24, 2020
The Department of Defense told reporters Friday that nearly three dozen US service members have been diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries in the aftermath of the Iranian missile attack on US forces in Iraq earlier this month, according to multiple reports.
The Pentagon, following repeated questions, revealed Friday that a total of 34 US service members have been diagnosed with concussions and traumatic brain injuries, some of whom were flown to Germany and the US for treatment. (The Pentagon is reportedly using those two terms interchangeably).
The department said that the delays in reporting the TBIs is that these injuries are not always immediately apparent. "Some of these conditions manifest over time, symptoms can get better and get worse. This is a snapshot in time," Pentagon spokesman John Hoffman explained.
A concussion is a type of traumatic brain injury — damage affecting the brain's normal function caused by a sudden blow to the head or the severe shaking of the head and body.
Immediately following the Jan. 8 ballistic missile attack on US and coalition forces at Al Asad Air Base and in Irbil, President Donald Trump proudly announced that "no Americans were harmed."
A little over a week later, US Central Command revealed that there were, in fact, injuries.
"While no U.S. service members were killed in the Jan. 8 Iranian attack on Al Asad Air base, several were treated for concussion symptoms from the blast and are still being assessed," CENTCOM spokesman Capt. Bill Urban explained in a statement.
He said that a total of 11 US service members had to be transported to facilities in Germany and Kuwait for additional screening and treatment.
On Tuesday, Jan. 21, The Washington Post reported that the number was higher, although it did not give a specific number.
When questioned Wednesday about his earlier statement, now known to be inaccurate, Trump downplayed the severity of the injuries, saying they are "not very serious."
"I heard that they had headaches and a couple of other things, but I would say and I can report that it's not very serious," the president told the press in Davos, Switzerland. "I don't consider them very serious injuries relative to other injuries that I've seen."
When an Associated Press reporter asked for more information about these injuries on Jan. 23, a CENTCOM spokesman told him they'll no longer "play this game."
EDITOR’S NOTE: I think Trump is downplaying the seriousness of brain injuries because he does not want to carry out his threat to punish Iran if they cause any harm to Americans. Either that, or he is an ignoramus.
CHINA SHUTTING DOWN MORE CITIES
by Bob Walsh
It seems that China is shutting down more cities, movie theaters and other places where people get together in close quarters in large numbers. Schools in some areas are being closed.
The American authorities are openly speculating that China is low-balling their stats to cut into public unrest over the problem. I don't doubt that for a minute.
It seems that China is shutting down more cities, movie theaters and other places where people get together in close quarters in large numbers. Schools in some areas are being closed.
The American authorities are openly speculating that China is low-balling their stats to cut into public unrest over the problem. I don't doubt that for a minute.
ANGRY FATHER CONFRONTS WARREN OVER HER STUDENT DEBT CANCELLATION PLAN
Elizabeth Warren confronted by Iowa dad over student loan plan, saying people paying for tuition would get 'screwed'
By Morgan Phillips
Fox News
January 23, 2020
An angry father confronted Sen. Elizabeth Warren saying those who responsibly saved to pay for student loans themselves would get “screwed” under her student debt cancellation plan.
"I just wanted to ask one question. My daughter is getting out of school. I've saved all my money. She doesn't have any student loans. Am I going to get my money back?" the father asked Warren in a photo line after a presidential campaign town hall in Grimes, Iowa, on Monday.
“Of course not,” Warren answered, without hesitation.
"So you're going to pay for people who didn't save any money and those of us who did the right thing get screwed?” the father pressed.
Warren as a campaign platform has introduced not only universal free public college but also a cancellation of federal student loan debt for up to $50,000 for those making under $100,000 per year. She even said she'd do so on her first day in the White House, and bypass Congress if necessary.
She claimed this policy would “cancel debt for more than 95 percent of the nearly 45 million Americans with student loan debt.” She also said it would mitigate the racial wealth gap.
“My buddy had fun, bought a car, and went on all the vacations, I saved my money. He makes more than I did. I worked a double shift,” the father continued.
“Youre laughing at me,” the man said, which Warren denied. “Yeah that’s exactly what you’re doing. We did the right thing and we get screwed,” he can be heard telling Warren.
“I appreciate your time,” Warren responded.
Warren has said she would pay for the plan, estimated to cost $640 billion, with a 2 percent "wealth tax" on individuals earning greater than $50 million. She's said the wealth tax would raise enough to fund not only student loan debt cancellation and free public college but also universal pre-K.
The senator earlier introduced a student loan debt bill in Congress with fellow Democrat Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina. But Warren, writing on the website Medium, said that she would act without waiting for Congress because the Secretary of Education can “use its discretion to wipe away loans even when they do not meet the eligibility criteria for more specific cancellation programs.”
By Morgan Phillips
Fox News
January 23, 2020
An angry father confronted Sen. Elizabeth Warren saying those who responsibly saved to pay for student loans themselves would get “screwed” under her student debt cancellation plan.
"I just wanted to ask one question. My daughter is getting out of school. I've saved all my money. She doesn't have any student loans. Am I going to get my money back?" the father asked Warren in a photo line after a presidential campaign town hall in Grimes, Iowa, on Monday.
“Of course not,” Warren answered, without hesitation.
"So you're going to pay for people who didn't save any money and those of us who did the right thing get screwed?” the father pressed.
Warren as a campaign platform has introduced not only universal free public college but also a cancellation of federal student loan debt for up to $50,000 for those making under $100,000 per year. She even said she'd do so on her first day in the White House, and bypass Congress if necessary.
She claimed this policy would “cancel debt for more than 95 percent of the nearly 45 million Americans with student loan debt.” She also said it would mitigate the racial wealth gap.
“My buddy had fun, bought a car, and went on all the vacations, I saved my money. He makes more than I did. I worked a double shift,” the father continued.
“Youre laughing at me,” the man said, which Warren denied. “Yeah that’s exactly what you’re doing. We did the right thing and we get screwed,” he can be heard telling Warren.
“I appreciate your time,” Warren responded.
Warren has said she would pay for the plan, estimated to cost $640 billion, with a 2 percent "wealth tax" on individuals earning greater than $50 million. She's said the wealth tax would raise enough to fund not only student loan debt cancellation and free public college but also universal pre-K.
The senator earlier introduced a student loan debt bill in Congress with fellow Democrat Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina. But Warren, writing on the website Medium, said that she would act without waiting for Congress because the Secretary of Education can “use its discretion to wipe away loans even when they do not meet the eligibility criteria for more specific cancellation programs.”
SEND HER BACK THEY WILL ….. BUT NOT TO SOMALIA
Rep. Ilhan Omar launches reelection bid with big advantages, including a massive bank account
By Steve Karnowski
Associated Press
January 23, 2020
MINNEAPOLIS -- Rep. Ilhan Omar’s congressional career got off to a rocky start just a year ago, with her provocative remarks on Israel and Jews stirring anger across the country and raising speculation that some other Minnesota Democrat might step forward to challenge her in 2020.
That was then.
Omar was kicking off her reelection campaign Thursday night with a massive bank account and no challengers who pose a serious threat from either party. Her campaign slogan — “Send her back to Congress!” — gleefully evokes President Donald Trump’s personal attacks on her.
In an overwhelmingly Democratic district that where Omar took 78% of the vote in 2018, University of Minnesota political scientist Larry Jacobs gives her opponents no chance.
“This is one of the most progressive-liberal districts in the country and Rep. Omar is one of the most progressive-liberal members of Congress,” Jacobs said. “She’s a fit for the district even if Democrats around the country are uncomfortable with her positions and her style.”
Omar, a Somali American immigrant, became a national figure in 2018 as one of the first two Muslim women elected to Congress. But her tweets last February insinuating that lawmakers support Israel because they have been bought off came under intense bipartisan criticism. She added fuel to the fire last March by suggesting that Jewish Americans have divided loyalties between the U.S. and Israel.
Trump moved quickly to try to make Omar and three other freshmen congresswomen of color — known as “The Squad” — the face of his opposition, saying they should “go back” to their counties, even though only Omar was foreign born. His supporters chanted, "Send her back!" at a rally a few days later in North Carolina. But Omar received a hero’s welcome at the airport when she returned home from Washington that week.
Trump's attention to Omar has helped her raise enormous amounts of money, and she's used the national stage effectively, Jacobs said.
Omar raised more than $2.5 million through last year’s third quarter, the latest figures available, and had $1.56 million in the bank. Her fundraising was more than triple the House incumbent average, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Omar did not immediately respond to a request for an interview ahead of her kickoff.
Omar's only real primary threat would have to come from a Democratic officeholder, but none has stepped forward, said Kathryn Pearson, another University of Minnesota political scientist.
One of her three little-known Democratic challengers, mediator Antone Melton-Meaux, did raise more than $200,000 in the fourth quarter, with more than $180,000 in the bank. His strong support for Israel and opposition to the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divest and Sanctions movement contrast with Omar’s positions.
“I don’t think he poses a serious threat, but the fact that he raised a chunk of money fairly quickly, it shows that while Rep. Omar is pretty safe, it doesn’t mean there aren’t some Democrats who are unhappy with her performance in Congress so far,” Pearson said.
Taking advantage of conservative dislike of Omar nationally, her likely GOP opponent, black businessman Lacy Johnson, raised nearly $478,000 by the end of the third quarter but had spent most of that.
Divisions still remain between Omar and some Jewish community leaders, though they’re not expected to make a big dent in her margin of victory.
“The injury and ill-confidence ... have not been adequately addressed,” said Steve Hunegs, executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Minnesota and the Dakotas, who lives in her district. “The community will pay close attention to her in the 2020 election cycle.”
While Omar’s job seems secure for now, her long-range future is less clear.
“This is the beginning of what I think will be a series of nationally prominent and contested races against Rep. Omar,” Jacobs said. “I think at some point it’s going to beat her down.”
By Steve Karnowski
Associated Press
January 23, 2020
MINNEAPOLIS -- Rep. Ilhan Omar’s congressional career got off to a rocky start just a year ago, with her provocative remarks on Israel and Jews stirring anger across the country and raising speculation that some other Minnesota Democrat might step forward to challenge her in 2020.
That was then.
Omar was kicking off her reelection campaign Thursday night with a massive bank account and no challengers who pose a serious threat from either party. Her campaign slogan — “Send her back to Congress!” — gleefully evokes President Donald Trump’s personal attacks on her.
In an overwhelmingly Democratic district that where Omar took 78% of the vote in 2018, University of Minnesota political scientist Larry Jacobs gives her opponents no chance.
“This is one of the most progressive-liberal districts in the country and Rep. Omar is one of the most progressive-liberal members of Congress,” Jacobs said. “She’s a fit for the district even if Democrats around the country are uncomfortable with her positions and her style.”
Omar, a Somali American immigrant, became a national figure in 2018 as one of the first two Muslim women elected to Congress. But her tweets last February insinuating that lawmakers support Israel because they have been bought off came under intense bipartisan criticism. She added fuel to the fire last March by suggesting that Jewish Americans have divided loyalties between the U.S. and Israel.
Trump moved quickly to try to make Omar and three other freshmen congresswomen of color — known as “The Squad” — the face of his opposition, saying they should “go back” to their counties, even though only Omar was foreign born. His supporters chanted, "Send her back!" at a rally a few days later in North Carolina. But Omar received a hero’s welcome at the airport when she returned home from Washington that week.
Trump's attention to Omar has helped her raise enormous amounts of money, and she's used the national stage effectively, Jacobs said.
Omar raised more than $2.5 million through last year’s third quarter, the latest figures available, and had $1.56 million in the bank. Her fundraising was more than triple the House incumbent average, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Omar did not immediately respond to a request for an interview ahead of her kickoff.
Omar's only real primary threat would have to come from a Democratic officeholder, but none has stepped forward, said Kathryn Pearson, another University of Minnesota political scientist.
One of her three little-known Democratic challengers, mediator Antone Melton-Meaux, did raise more than $200,000 in the fourth quarter, with more than $180,000 in the bank. His strong support for Israel and opposition to the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divest and Sanctions movement contrast with Omar’s positions.
“I don’t think he poses a serious threat, but the fact that he raised a chunk of money fairly quickly, it shows that while Rep. Omar is pretty safe, it doesn’t mean there aren’t some Democrats who are unhappy with her performance in Congress so far,” Pearson said.
Taking advantage of conservative dislike of Omar nationally, her likely GOP opponent, black businessman Lacy Johnson, raised nearly $478,000 by the end of the third quarter but had spent most of that.
Divisions still remain between Omar and some Jewish community leaders, though they’re not expected to make a big dent in her margin of victory.
“The injury and ill-confidence ... have not been adequately addressed,” said Steve Hunegs, executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Minnesota and the Dakotas, who lives in her district. “The community will pay close attention to her in the 2020 election cycle.”
While Omar’s job seems secure for now, her long-range future is less clear.
“This is the beginning of what I think will be a series of nationally prominent and contested races against Rep. Omar,” Jacobs said. “I think at some point it’s going to beat her down.”
STORMY BUSTING COPS CANNED
Two Ohio police officers fired over Stormy Daniels arrest
By Adam Schrader
New York Post
January 23, 2020
The Columbus Police Department in Ohio fired two officers Thursday over their controversial arrest of porn star Stormy Daniels, 40, at a strip club in 2018.
Columbus’ Director of Public Safety Ned Pettus Jr. officially canned Steven Rosser and Whitney Lancaster after agreeing with a recommendation from Police Chief Thomas Quinlan — who hit the cops with departmental charges last year.
The disgraced cops have 10 days to appeal the decision.
Rosser and Lancaster were two of the four cops who conducted the arrest at Sirens Gentlemen’s Club and accused Daniels of letting patrons touch her, a violation of state law, Daniels lawyer Michael Avenatti said at the time.
The charges were quickly dropped by prosecutors.
Daniels — who was paid $130,000 in hush money by Michael Cohen over her alleged 2006 affair with Donald Trump — has sued the cops, claiming they orchestrated the arrest to protect the president.
Documents viewed by WSYZ show that Rosser lied when he said in an interview he wanted to search for an underage stripper named “Pearl” in a human trafficking investigation — but never actually conducted the search.
The other two officers, Sgt. Scott Soha and Lt. Ronald Kemmerling, were suspended, WSYZ reported.
In September, Daniels received a $450,000 payout after the city settled another lawsuit she had filed for the improper arrest.
Avenatti, who is no longer representing Daniels, pleaded not guilty last May to stealing $300,000 from his client. He was recently arrested for bail violation — after allegedly trying to extort Nike.
By Adam Schrader
New York Post
January 23, 2020
The Columbus Police Department in Ohio fired two officers Thursday over their controversial arrest of porn star Stormy Daniels, 40, at a strip club in 2018.
Columbus’ Director of Public Safety Ned Pettus Jr. officially canned Steven Rosser and Whitney Lancaster after agreeing with a recommendation from Police Chief Thomas Quinlan — who hit the cops with departmental charges last year.
The disgraced cops have 10 days to appeal the decision.
Rosser and Lancaster were two of the four cops who conducted the arrest at Sirens Gentlemen’s Club and accused Daniels of letting patrons touch her, a violation of state law, Daniels lawyer Michael Avenatti said at the time.
The charges were quickly dropped by prosecutors.
Daniels — who was paid $130,000 in hush money by Michael Cohen over her alleged 2006 affair with Donald Trump — has sued the cops, claiming they orchestrated the arrest to protect the president.
Documents viewed by WSYZ show that Rosser lied when he said in an interview he wanted to search for an underage stripper named “Pearl” in a human trafficking investigation — but never actually conducted the search.
The other two officers, Sgt. Scott Soha and Lt. Ronald Kemmerling, were suspended, WSYZ reported.
In September, Daniels received a $450,000 payout after the city settled another lawsuit she had filed for the improper arrest.
Avenatti, who is no longer representing Daniels, pleaded not guilty last May to stealing $300,000 from his client. He was recently arrested for bail violation — after allegedly trying to extort Nike.
NETANYAHU GETS SUMMONED TO THE WHITE HOUSE
Trump's invitation has changed the stakes of the Israeli elections
By Caroline B. Glick
Israel Hayom
January 24, 2020
Leaks about the details of President Donald Trump's peace plan are contradictory. Until the President releases his plan officially, we won’t know for certain what it involves. But from what we have experienced so far with the Trump administration generally and President Trump in particular, it is clear that Trump does not accept the premise that formed the foundation of the Oslo peace process with the Palestine Liberation Organization.
The 1993 Oslo framework for peace, and every peace plan that derived from it since, was based on the assumption that the PLO gets a veto over Israel's right to secure its interests and assert its sovereign rights in Judea and Samaria.
Comments this week from Blue and White Party officials, from party head Benny Gantz on down the line demonstrated that Israel’s largest center-left faction, the party competing with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud for national leadership, adheres to this assumption unequivocally. Without the PLO’s permission, or what Gantz referred to on Tuesday as "coordination with the international community," (which amounts to the same thing), Gantz and his colleagues assert that Israel mustn’t apply its laws to the Jordan Valley or to any other part of Judea and Samaria.
Trump's sudden decision to summon Netanyahu to the White House for a meeting next Tuesday and his acceptance of Netanyahu’s request that Gantz also be invited, puts Gantz in a bind.
Clearly Trump’s move is dictated by U.S. electoral considerations. With the Democratic presidential primaries set to begin in just over a week, Trump cannot wait for the March 2 elections to make his move. By the time a government is finally formed in Israel – assuming the election results are conclusive this time around – Trump will be too busy with his reelection campaign to focus on Israel and the Palestinians.
Which brings us to Gantz and his invitation to the White House.
On the one hand, by agreeing to let Gantz join Netanyahu, Trump is granting the opposition leader the stature of a national leader, almost on par with Netanyahu.
But on the other hand, Trump is driving a wedge into the heart of Gantz’s party. Blue and White is not an organic party. It is a combined list of three different parties. Two of those parties lean left to various degrees. One leans right. To win over swing voters, Gantz has placed the right-wing candidates front and center and tried to keep the more leftist ideological majority of his party members on the sidelines.
The problem is that the left-leaning majority of his party cannot accept Trump’s rejection of the PLO veto. The likes of MKs Yael German and Ofer Shelah, who represent the majority of his party members have made clear that they will not accept any deviation from the Oslo line. They accept the anti-Israel narrative of the post-Zionist left and the "international community" which places all the blame on Israel for the absence of peace.
They believe that Israel must appease the PLO by giving up all – or nearly all – of Judea and Samaria and half of Jerusalem, even if that means mass expulsions of hundreds of thousands of law-abiding Jews from their homes. Moreover, as German made clear this week, as far as she and her colleagues are concerned, if the PLO won’t agree to a deal, then Israel should repeat its 2005 unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in Judea and Samaria. The fact that Hamas was quick to seize control over the Gaza Strip after Israel’s withdrawal is of no concern to her.
For Gantz to accept Trump’s peace plan, he will have to break away from the anti-Israeli narrative of the post-Zionist Left, held by the majority of his party members. Doing so would help him win the election. But it will also unravel his party.
If Gantz chooses instead to reject Trump’s plan and stand with Garmen and Shelah and the rest, if he rejects the administration’s pro-Israel approach which negates the notion that Israel’s enemies get to decide if Israel can assert its rights and secure its interests as a sovereign state, Gantz’s chances of winning the elections will diminish.
It’s hard to know how Gantz will respond. What we know for sure is that Trump's abrupt invitation changed the face of the election.
Until Thursday evening, the third election in a year was nothing more than an annoying beauty pageant where Israelis, already weary and fed up with our politicians, were expected to choose from a list of unattractive options. After Thursday evening, the March 2 vote was transformed into a referendum about national sovereignty and Zionism.
While we still don’t know what the Trump plan entails, we know for sure that things just got a lot more interesting.
By Caroline B. Glick
Israel Hayom
January 24, 2020
Leaks about the details of President Donald Trump's peace plan are contradictory. Until the President releases his plan officially, we won’t know for certain what it involves. But from what we have experienced so far with the Trump administration generally and President Trump in particular, it is clear that Trump does not accept the premise that formed the foundation of the Oslo peace process with the Palestine Liberation Organization.
The 1993 Oslo framework for peace, and every peace plan that derived from it since, was based on the assumption that the PLO gets a veto over Israel's right to secure its interests and assert its sovereign rights in Judea and Samaria.
Comments this week from Blue and White Party officials, from party head Benny Gantz on down the line demonstrated that Israel’s largest center-left faction, the party competing with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud for national leadership, adheres to this assumption unequivocally. Without the PLO’s permission, or what Gantz referred to on Tuesday as "coordination with the international community," (which amounts to the same thing), Gantz and his colleagues assert that Israel mustn’t apply its laws to the Jordan Valley or to any other part of Judea and Samaria.
Trump's sudden decision to summon Netanyahu to the White House for a meeting next Tuesday and his acceptance of Netanyahu’s request that Gantz also be invited, puts Gantz in a bind.
Clearly Trump’s move is dictated by U.S. electoral considerations. With the Democratic presidential primaries set to begin in just over a week, Trump cannot wait for the March 2 elections to make his move. By the time a government is finally formed in Israel – assuming the election results are conclusive this time around – Trump will be too busy with his reelection campaign to focus on Israel and the Palestinians.
Which brings us to Gantz and his invitation to the White House.
On the one hand, by agreeing to let Gantz join Netanyahu, Trump is granting the opposition leader the stature of a national leader, almost on par with Netanyahu.
But on the other hand, Trump is driving a wedge into the heart of Gantz’s party. Blue and White is not an organic party. It is a combined list of three different parties. Two of those parties lean left to various degrees. One leans right. To win over swing voters, Gantz has placed the right-wing candidates front and center and tried to keep the more leftist ideological majority of his party members on the sidelines.
The problem is that the left-leaning majority of his party cannot accept Trump’s rejection of the PLO veto. The likes of MKs Yael German and Ofer Shelah, who represent the majority of his party members have made clear that they will not accept any deviation from the Oslo line. They accept the anti-Israel narrative of the post-Zionist left and the "international community" which places all the blame on Israel for the absence of peace.
They believe that Israel must appease the PLO by giving up all – or nearly all – of Judea and Samaria and half of Jerusalem, even if that means mass expulsions of hundreds of thousands of law-abiding Jews from their homes. Moreover, as German made clear this week, as far as she and her colleagues are concerned, if the PLO won’t agree to a deal, then Israel should repeat its 2005 unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in Judea and Samaria. The fact that Hamas was quick to seize control over the Gaza Strip after Israel’s withdrawal is of no concern to her.
For Gantz to accept Trump’s peace plan, he will have to break away from the anti-Israeli narrative of the post-Zionist Left, held by the majority of his party members. Doing so would help him win the election. But it will also unravel his party.
If Gantz chooses instead to reject Trump’s plan and stand with Garmen and Shelah and the rest, if he rejects the administration’s pro-Israel approach which negates the notion that Israel’s enemies get to decide if Israel can assert its rights and secure its interests as a sovereign state, Gantz’s chances of winning the elections will diminish.
It’s hard to know how Gantz will respond. What we know for sure is that Trump's abrupt invitation changed the face of the election.
Until Thursday evening, the third election in a year was nothing more than an annoying beauty pageant where Israelis, already weary and fed up with our politicians, were expected to choose from a list of unattractive options. After Thursday evening, the March 2 vote was transformed into a referendum about national sovereignty and Zionism.
While we still don’t know what the Trump plan entails, we know for sure that things just got a lot more interesting.
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