BDS Is Serious! More Morality Than Politics! Anti-Authority Ideology Spawned in The Sixties Still Haunts Us!

No wonder the mail takes so long!

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What is BDS,  why is it so significant to me and probably should be to others? 

Some background:

"Young scholars’ views on BDS can threaten their career prospects, he said.

“People who are even mildly supportive of Israel are in kind of a delicate position in academia. If you’re a graduate student or junior untenured professor you’re really fighting a strong anti-Israel climate in a lot of departments and your future could be on the line,” said Greenberg. “It’s no secret that there are almost no conservatives in the historical profession. Support for Israel has become equated with the conservative position. Anyone remotely supportive of Israel faces the legitimate worry that they will suffer as a result.”

“You should be able to say that I’m a Zionist and still get tenure and people shouldn’t care. It shouldn’t impinge on judgments of your scholarship. But it does.” (See 1 below.)

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Making the same mistake! (See 2 below.)


Meanwhile Obama is correct in that were Iran to give up its nuclear ambitions it could become a regional power.

Of course that implies Iran's leadership becoming rational, disavowing hate and funding of terrorists and that is where I would be willing to bet against Obama's dreamy thinking. (See 2a below.)
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My friend, Star Parker, is a champ who lifted herself by her bootstraps and calls for more morality and less politics. (See 3 below.)
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New Obama appointment.  I just could not' ignoor it!' (See 4 below.)
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More on Obama's awesome recovery! (See 5 below.)
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More police targeted and you can lay it all at the feet of Sharpton. deBlasio, Obama , Holder and Liberal philosophy of contempt for authority figures  spawned in the 60's! (See 6 below.)
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Dick

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1) The year BDS became the number one concern for American Jews

Last academic year, Jewish groups faced the 'most organized campaign to demonize Israel,' says Hillel CEO. In response, Jewish organizations have shifted their strategy.

By Debra Nussbaum Cohen

This was the year that the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement moved to the center of the American Jewish community’s agenda.

While BDS efforts began more than a decade ago and have not reached the level of impact that similar work has in Europe, BDS proponents claim progress.

This academic year “we faced the most organized campaign to demonize Israel and attack pro-Israel students we have ever seen,” wrote Hillel CEO Eric Fingerhut in a Dec. 22nd letter to Hillel International board members. “We were prepared,” he wrote, citing Hillel’s work with nearly 250 campus professionals on communications and other training, and plans to bring many to Israel in January.

The academic sphere is a major focus, with BDS resolutions brought before student governments and graduate student unions, as well as academic associations of college professors. The next attempt will be at the annual conference of the American Historical Association, a 14,000-member group meeting in early January in New York City

BDS has become a central focus for the organized American Jewish community, which views it as a long-term threat. This year new coalitions were formed and efforts to fight it intensified by countering anti-Israel speakers and events on college campuses with others on the pro-Israel side. A new book of nearly three dozen essays, “The Case Against Academic Boycotts of Israel,” edited by Cary Nelson and Gabriel Noah Brahm, has just been published.

Prompted in part by last summer’s Gaza war, “we certainly did see an increase in anti-Israel activity in the beginning of the semester but simultaneously we’ve seen a dramatic surge in pro-Israel activism. The movement has never been broader, has never been stronger,” said Jacob Baime, executive director of the Israel on Campus Coalition. “We’re tracking at least 4 or 5 pro-Israel events for every anti-Israel event. Pro-Israel activism by far outweighs anti-Israel activity in the aggregate. There are tons of pro-Israel speakers for every anti-Israel speaker” on a campus, he said.

One of the few BDS resolutions to win endorsement in a college system was at the University of California, whose graduate student union members on December 10th approved a resolution that calls on the UC system and United Auto Workers International union “to divest from companies involved in Israeli occupation and apartheid.” The union has 13,000 members working as teaching assistants and tutors on UC’s nine campuses.

Just over half the 2,100 union members who voted personally pledged not to participate in any research, conferences, events or exchange programs sponsored by Israeli universities.

Another was at Chicago’s Catholic DePaul University, where divestmentnarrowly won a student referendum in May.

A similar measure was rejected in the City University of New York’s graduate student union.

BDS opponents say in the U.S. “the BDS campaign has been a complete failure. They have not really succeeded in convincing anybody except a handful of students and some professors that this in any way will contribute to peace or improving the lot of Palestinians,” said Mitchell Bard, executive director of the Israeli-American Cooperative Enterprise, a group which brings Israeli academics to American campuses.

“When it comes to campuses, the boycott has been a colossal failure,” he said. “There are roughly 2,000 four-year colleges in the U.S., and in the last academic year there were 16 or 17 divestment resolutions and they lost at least 12.”

ell Bard. Photo by Renee Comet

Andrew Kadi, an IT professional of Palestinian descent in Washington, D.C., is co-chair of the U.S. Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation. In an interview, he took issue with Bard’s description. If “this has been a complete failure, then why is so much money being invested in trying to counter it? All of the explicitly Zionist Jewish organizations in the country seem to be investing very heavily in the millions to oppose BDS,” Kadi said.

“I am not going to sit here and try and paint boycott as the greatest victory success of this year. This is a long-term process. It took 10 to 15 years for these type of campaigns to help end apartheid in South Africa, for those campaigns to have an effect at the policy level.”

Kadi acknowledged that BDS has been far more influential in Europe. “In the U.S., he said, “we still have a long ways to go.”

Death by papercuts

American Jewish organizations are shifting strategy in order to make change in the long term, moving toward building relationships with potential partners rather than being reactive when a new BDS initiative emerges.

“All of the leaders of our community believe we have to broaden our efforts. We all believe that this is not just a Jewish issue, but an American issue,” said Baime. “We’re seeing pro-Israel students active in politics making new allies outside the pro-Israel traditional circles.”

The David Project, for instance, is growing a program that this winter break will bring a pro-Israel student and two or three non-Jewish campus leaders they invite on a trip to Israel. This year it involves 32 campuses. Next year, said Philip Brodsky, the group’s executive director, they plan to involve 40.

“The community has gotten more sophisticated in understanding that every fight doesn’t have to be at the nuclear level,” said Bard. “Different tools are needed.”

“There are reasons to be concerned about growing disaffection from Israel, concern that even if today we have support, 10 years down the road we will have a bigger problem,” said Geri Palast, director of the Israel Action Network. Her network, which supports pro-Israel work at Hillels, JCRCs and non-Jewish groups like churches and black and Latino organizations, is a partnership between Jewish Federations of North America and the Jewish Center for Public Affairs and has a $1.5 million annual budget.

A decade from now, “will you have a progressive community in America that is no longer as supportive of Israel as they are today because they’ve grown up in this environment? That’s what you have to think about – not the resolution itself.”

“It’s death by a thousand papercuts,” Bard said. “People seem to feel we need to defeat it everywhere so they don’t gain the foothold or confidence they’ll need to succeed.’

Ethan Felson, vice president of the JCPA, the community relations arm of the organized Jewish community, said there should be a positive focus to anti-BDS efforts. “We’re trying to develop a movement in support of peace embodied in two states for two people, not fighting some bogeyman,” he said.

Felson tracks BDS efforts among Christian churches and said that he anticipates divestment resolutions similar to that passed in June by thePresbyterian Church (USA) to be raised in just about every mainline Protestant denomination in the coming year.

Entry point to academia

BDS proponents say their efforts this year have yielded success.

“BDS efforts have been greatly effective,” said Sydney Levy, advocacy director of Jewish Voice for Peace, which describes itself as part of the BDS movement. The decision of Durham, NC, to drop a $1 million contract withG4S, a multinational security corporation, over the company’s work in Israeli prisons and security checkpoints is one reflection of their success, Levy said.

Another is SodaStream’s decision to move its factory from a West Bank industrial park to a town in southern Israel. The home seltzer-maker manufacturer said in November it was moving for purely commercial reasons. But, Levy told Haaretz, that it is “moving out of a settlement shows the success of the BDS campaign.”

Beyond, perhaps, that instance, the BDS fight is not influencing Israeli policy, said JCPA’s Felson. “Even if Israelis are aware of the BDS movement, it’s not a motivator. Israeli leaders make decisions and Israeli voters make decisions based on far more tangible factors like security, their economic interests and political concerns. They’re inured to international isolation. They’re used to the UN and the EU and this one here and that one there saying they should go away.”

BDS has also not impacted Americans’ views on Israel, as a whole. In focus groups with influential non-Jewish Americans “no one knew what BDS was,” said a source, who did not want to be named. “It consumes a lot of our energy but it doesn’t have much reach. We think the whole world is BDS. It’s not so much.”

One arena in which BDS advocates have been notably successful this year is in academia, where being pro-boycott and divestment has become a near prerequisite for progressive bona fides.

“Our contacts on campuses are extremely alarmed at the way the Palestinian issue is being framed as a kind of entry point for people who want to see themselves as defenders of the downtrodden,” said Gideon Aronoff, CEO of Ameinu, a liberal Zionist organization that started TheThird Narrative in 2013. This year TTN launched a forum for academics who oppose both the occupation and boycotts of Israeli universities.

“Its ability to become a sort of huckster for being properly left is very worrisome. When it becomes this kind of ideological signifying issue it loses its ability to be countered with factual arguments. That transition has happened this year,” Aronoff said.

The next battle?

At next month’s conference of the American Historical Association, which has 14,000 members, there will be a roundtable discussion by historians “critical of Israeli policy,” said one of the organizers, Van Gosse, and two resolutions condemning Israel will be raised at the business meeting.

Historians Against The War, a group started in 2003 to oppose the American occupation of Iraq, is trying to put the Israeli occupation on the AHA’s agenda.

Their resolutions reprimand Israel for “acts of violence and intimidation by the State of Israel against Palestinian researchers and their archival collections, acts which can destroy Palestinians’ sense of historical identity as well as the historical record itself,” for “refusing to allow students from Gaza to travel in order to pursue higher education abroad, and even at West Bank universities” and its “policy of denying entry to foreign nationals seeking to promote educational development in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.”

“If you move a large body like the AHA, which has real standing, that changes consciousness and opinion,” said Gosse, associate professor of history at Pennsylvania’s Franklin and Marshall College, and a member of HAW and the AHA. “If we stimulate debate on these issues, that’s what we’re seeking to do,” said Gosse, who has personally donated money toJVP.

The AHA has not addressed international issues in his four years as AHA’s executive director, said Jim Grossman but previously that took a stand on the freedom of scholars in Russia. Grossman declined to share if he is Jewish or pro-Israel, saying, “my views on this are irrelevant. If there are historians whose rights as scholars, whose academic freedom is being constrained then we will speak out on their behalf.”

The AHA would join several other academic associations that have put anti-Israel resolutions on their dockets in the past year, though the AHA is the largest by far. The Middle East Studies Association adopted a policy last month allowing its 2,700 members to boycott Israel. The American Studies Association, with 5,000 members, passed a resolution to boycott Israeli academics and institutions in December 2013, though Israeli scholars were permitted to participate in its conference this year.

The American Anthropological Association rejected an anti-boycott measure at its annual conference last month, instead appointing a task force to bring recommendations to its 2015 conference. The Modern Language Association, which has nearly 24,000 members, rejected an Israel boycott motion at its conference in June.

Some pro-Israel historians members said they are working behind the scenes to try to scuttle boycott efforts at the AHA.

“The notion the AHA will have any effect whatsoever on Israel’s policies in the West Bank or nudging the parties toward negotiations is ridiculous,” David Greenberg told Haaretz. Greenberg is associate professor of history, journalism and media studies at N.J.’s Rutgers University. “There is a worldwide campaign of delegitimization of Israel. Every little piece makes a difference. In and of itself it’s not important but insofar that it contributes to the idea that Israel should be a pariah state it’s a bad thing. It’s bad for the AHA, it alienates Jewish members and creates divisions.”

Young scholars’ views on BDS can threaten their career prospects, he said.

“People who are even mildly supportive of Israel are in kind of a delicate position in academia. If you’re a graduate student or junior untenured professor you’re really fighting a strong anti-Israel climate in a lot of departments and your future could be on the line,” said Greenberg. “It’s no secret that there are almost no conservatives in the historical profession. Support for Israel has become equated with the conservative position. Anyone remotely supportive of Israel faces the legitimate worry that they will suffer as a result.”

“You should be able to say that I’m a Zionist and still get tenure and people shouldn’t care. It shouldn’t impinge on judgments of your scholarship. But it does.”

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2)

 

Kim Jung Un had NO military experience whatsoever before Daddy made him a four-star general. This snot-nosed twerp had never accomplished anything in his life that would even come close to military leadership.

He hadn't even so much as led a Cub Scout troop, coached a sports team, or commanded a military platoon. So he is made the "Beloved Leader" Of North Korea .

Terrific!- * * Keep scrolling. * * * * Oh crap! I'm sorry.  I just remembered that we did the same thing. We took an arrogant phony community organizer, who had never worn a uniform, and made him

Commander-in-Chief. A guy, who had never had a real job, worked on a budget, or led anything more than an ACORN demonstration, and we made him "Beloved Leader" of the United States TWICE !!! I'm sorry I brought this up . . . Never mind.

2a)

Obama: Iran could be very successful regional power if it curbs nuclear program By REUTERS In a tape that is set to air this week, US President says Iran should seize the chance of a deal that could lift crippling sanctions.

WASHINGTON - Iran could become a "very successful regional power" if Tehran agrees to a long-term deal to curb its nuclear program, President Barack Obama said in an interview with NPR News. "They've got a chance to get right with the world," Obama said in the interview, which was taped at the White House on Dec. 18 and is set to air this week. More than a year ago, Iran agreed to an interim plan to halt higher-level uranium enrichment in exchange for a limited easing in financial sanctions pending negotiations on a long-term deal. Those talks have now been extended to next June. Iran has said its nuclear program is for peaceful energy use, but the United States and five other powers want to make sure that Tehran cannot quickly develop nuclear weapons. Obama told NPR that Iran should seize the chance of a deal that could lift crippling sanctions. "Because if they do, there's incredible talent and resources and sophistication inside of Iran and it would be a very successful regional power that was also abiding by international norms and international rules - and that would be good for everybody," he said. Obama insisted a nuclear deal was possible, although Vice President Joe Biden earlier this month said he thought there was a "less than even shot" of an agreement. Obama said he recognized that Iran has "legitimate defense concerns" after it "suffered from a terrible war with Iraq" in the 1980s. But he criticized Tehran for its "adventurism, the support of organizations like Hezbollah, the threats they've directed at Israel." Asked whether he would use his last two years in office to help rebuild war-torn countries, Obama said it was up to countries like Libya, Syria and Iraq to take the lead. "We can help, but we can't do it for them," Obama said. "I think the American people recognize that. There are times here in Washington where pundits don't; they think you can just move chess pieces around the table. "And whenever we have that kind of hubris, we tend to get burned," he said. Obama rejected the idea of "devoting another trillion dollars" to sending US combat troops to fight Islamic State militants in Iraq. "We need to spend a trillion dollars rebuilding our schools, our roads, our basic science and research here in the United States," he said. Obama said he hoped to be able to work with Congress on shared economic goals. But he said he expected Republicans would pass some bills he will oppose, particularly on health care and the environment. "I haven't used the veto pen very often since I've been in office," Obama said. "Now I suspect there are going to be some times where I've got to pull that pen out."

2b)  Iranian Soldiers Photographed on Lebanon-Israel Border

by Cynthia Blank 

The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) has published a report documenting photographs of Iranian Revolutionary Guard soldiers "killing time" at the Lebanon-Israel border. 

Preliminary information suggests the pictures were taken in October, but were released only recently, along with verbal threats against Israel. Several photographs published contain the caption: "We have arrived to the cursed Israel." 

The Twitter account linked to the Revolutionary Guards uploaded a number of the pictures on Thursday, with the headline, "The Islamic Republic soldiers are on the border of occupied Palestine." 

The soldiers' faces were blurred, so as not to be identified. 

According to MEMRI's reports, the photos were also published a week and a half ago on the Iranian military's website. In this case, the soldiers' faces are visible. 

The Iranian military's websites showcases photos of soldiers taken in the Bekaa Valley and Baalbek in south Lebanon. "We have come close to the motherland of corruption - the cursed Israel. With Allah's help, we will trample over their bodies" the website writes. 

In October, the Hezbollah-affiliated Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar said that terrorists from Hezbollah, which controls south Lebanon, could be found operating in the area near the Litani River - in violation of a United Nations resolution. 

More recently, on Thursday, the Iranian army began a massive military drill sprawling from the farthest eastern expanses of the Islamic regime all the way to its southern maritime borders opposite the principality of Oman, in the Strait of Hormuz and the Gulf of Aden.

A full 13,000 Iranian soldiers are taking part in the six-day drill, reportedly marking the first time the Iranian navy is conducting a drill so far offshore.

Iranian media reported Saturday that Iran has begun running tests on a new weapon in their arsenal: domestically produced exploding "suicide" drones meant to strike targets on land, air and sea.

Iranian Navy Commander, Habib Allah Sayyari told a news conference that one of the main objective of the extensive military exercise is to convey a message of peace. 

He claims that Iran's neighbors need to know that improving the combat capabilities of the Iranian army are not directed toward anyone in particular, but are intended only for the protection of Iran's borders and interests. 

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3)-

For 2015: More Morality, Less Politics

By Star Parker

At the close of the last century, British conservative historian Paul Johnson wrote “A History of the American People.”

He began his sweeping panorama of our history in a most extraordinary way. He posed, on the very first page, three probing “fundamental questions” about the United States.

“First, can a nation rise above the injustices of its origins and, by its moral purpose and performance, atone for them? Second, “In the process of nation-building, can ideals and altruism – the desire to build the perfect community – be mixed successfully with acquisitiveness and ambition, without which no dynamic society can be built at all?” And third, “…Americans originally aimed to build an other-worldly “City on a Hill,” but found themselves designing a republic of the people, to be a model for the entire planet. Have they made good their audacious claims?”

As we enter year 15 of this new century, Johnson’s questions still stand before us.

Despite a stock market surging to record highs, a sense prevails that something is very wrong in America.

Big and troubling questions regarding issues of race and law enforcement stand before us.

Gallup shows a precipitous drop in opinion of non-white Americans regarding the ethical standards of police. Latest polling shows that only 23 percent of non-white Americans rate the standards of honesty and ethics of police officers high or very high, down 22 points from 45 percent in 2013.

Certainly it is not a sign of national health when a large portion of our population feels disenfranchised and vulnerable to what they perceive as arbitrary and capricious behavior, sometimes deadly, by those whose job it is to protect and serve.

We must ask, however, to what extent this phenomenon is a symptom of something bigger.

Today’s black sense of vulnerability is different from what it was in the past.

Black vulnerability in the past was the result of inadequate legal protections. Blacks’ historical struggle was about recognition of their essential humanity and equal rights and protections as citizens under the law of the land.

Today’s crisis is less about absence of legal protections but rather police operating in a nation where legal reality is increasingly dictated by politicians and unions rather than moral and constitutional clarity.

Clearly specific issues of police behavior need to be examined.

But we need to consider at the same time increasing politicization of the law across the board. Local law enforcement arbitrariness must be seen as symptomatic of arbitrariness at higher levels.

Consider that just recently our president waved a wand and made 5 million individuals who arrived in our country illegally, legal.

Or consider that according to the Congressional Budget Office 90 percent of those without health insurance will not pay the fines dictated by the Affordable Care Act because of waivers coming from the same sources that inspired the act to begin with.

Or consider that the IRS, whose job it is to collect taxes, has been turned into a political tool by those in power to pursue those they wish to harass.

America was founded as a nation under God. The whole idea was that there are prior truths originating from our Creator and the role of government is to secure these truths and protect citizens.

When the job of government is no longer to protect you but tell you where you can send your child to school, what that child can learn, what kind of health insurance you can buy, what employers can pay you, who you can hire and fire, where you can live if you are poor, how to save for retirement, you have already lost control over your life.

When we give power to the wrong people for the wrong reasons, we reap what we sow.

Let’s pray for 2015 to be a year where we see our challenges as moral rather than political.

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4) Meet Fatima Noor, President Obama's latest appointment to a high level position in the Department of Homeland Security, the post of Assistant Director for U.S. Citizenship and

Immigration.

Ms. Noor has little if any experience in the compliance or enforcement fields. Her total experience in government related work is limited to volunteer work with World Relief Memphis and as activities coordinator the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition. She majored in psychology with minors in Spanish and Arabic international relations. She recently completed a month-long research fellowship in Muslim psychology hosted by Carnegie-Mellon and the University of Pittsburgh ; her research will be ongoing as part of her work the DHS.  ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 5)  An 'Awesome Economy'? Not Even Close By Joseph Gestetner "Everything is awesome", stated the headline of a recent Politico piece by Michael Grunwald which goes on to list many economic statistics showing how well things are going in the U.S. Indeed, some economic indicators are now better now than when compared to the height of the crisis, but those conditions were bound to change just as most of the water in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina receded without anyone doing much to encourage it. All the same, current claims of doing “better” than during the depth of a major recession hide how bad things still are compared to before the crisis. Here are some examples: While crashing in recent months, gas prices at the pump still averaged this year above the pre-Obama annual averages. The Deficit for the just-concluded Federal budget year was larger (in both dollar terms and as a percent of the economy) than in the years before the crisis. Sales of existing homes are weaker than from before the bubble era, and sales of newly-built homes in 2014 was still weaker than all but two of the 45 years (!) leading up to Obama. The Unemployment Rate for all of 2014 is on pace to be worse than any annual average under Bush and worse than most Clinton years as well. Household Income is 4.5% lower compared to when the previous recession started seven years ago. The Poverty Rate -- the percent Americans living in poverty -- is worse than any year under Bush and worse than most Clinton years too despite the fact that the elevated Obama government spending for the poor suppresses the real poverty rate. The economy over the last twelve months ending in September rose by $727 billion (in raw dollars) but only after the Federal Reserve pumped $710 billion into the economy during the same period. The 120 days it took for the Dow to jump from 17K to 18K gave people some tickles but it is almost five times longer than the 26 days it took for the Dow to jump from 13K to 14K before the last recession. The Economic Stress Index in Obama's first year was indeed at a devastating record high of 19, yet the Index is closing 2014 at an elevated 8. While this is a big improvement, it is still weaker than the four years leading up the recession (2004-2007) when the Index averaged annually a 5. The same four years under Clinton, the Index averaged a 3 and the same years under President Reagan it averaged a 4. Why is the stress index still elevated? Simple: 1) GDP/economic growth is weaker now than in previous recoveries despite the fact that the Fed is still underpinning the economy with a $4.5 trillion balance sheet. If things were “awesome” or even close to good, the balance sheet could have been cut back to the minimal $800 billion (1/5 the current size!) it was before the crisis. But things are obviously not awesome. 2) The Underemployment Rate (U6) is still very elevated. The U6 is the broadest view of the employment situation because it counts the regular unemployed (reflective in the official Unemployment Rate) plus those desultorily looking for jobs, plus those who have only part-time jobs because the economy does not provide them a full-time job. The U6, along with the regular Unemployment Rate, does not count those who completely dropped out of the workforce because they gave up. Despite those missing millions, the U6 is still elevated. 3) Household Income is trailing badly. Yes, the economy is adding jobs but too many of those are part-time jobs, and many jobs -- including full time -- are paying bubkes; hence household income is still weak. In November, household income was 2.7% lower than when the recession “ended” in June of 2009 according to the widely-accepted Sentier Research, and it is 4.5% worse than when the recession started. Essentially, the narrow-area data points outlined above and the broad data points reflective in the Economic Stress Index are all still weak compared to the years or decades before Obama came in. Using 2009 as a starting point to measure current levels of “success” is flawed or at best simply misleading, because the depth of the crisis was never bound to remain the same forever. In fact, months into the crisis and shortly before Obama took office, the CBO projected that the economy in the four years 2011 through 2014 would grow annually at 4%, but we have not gotten anywhere close to those growth numbers. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 6) The President, Al Sharpton, and the Corruption of Modern Liberalism Peter Wehner New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, with his city roiling in the aftermath of the assassination of two NYPD officers, is imploring protesters–who until now he’s supported–to wait until after the funerals of two policemen before resuming their anti-police rallies. Al Sharpton–excuse me, the ReverendAl Sharpton–has declined. Which should come as a surprise to precisely no one.  After all, what would a day in Gotham be without protestersshouting, “What do we want? Dead cops. When do we want it? Now.” It tells you pretty much everything you need to know about the president and his White House and their views toward law enforcement and race relations that Sharpton is, in the words of Politico, “Obama’s go-to man on race.” He has direct contact with White House adviser and First Friend Valerie Jarrett, we’re told. He’s visited the White House at least 61 times since 2009, including meeting one on one with the president, who has publicly praised Sharpton, including sending an aide to read a message at a recent event commending Sharpton’s “dedication to the righteous cause of perfecting our union.” Sharpton was among a small group at the White House when the president announced his nomination of Loretta E. Lynch, the United States attorney for the Eastern District of New York, to become the next attorney general. “There’s a trust factor with The Rev from the Oval Office on down,” a White House official familiar with their dealings told reporter Glenn Thrush. “He gets it, and he’s got credibility in the community that nobody else has got. There’s really no one else out there who does what he does.” That last statement is true; there isn’t anyone out there who does what Sharpton does quite the way he does it. Al Sharpton is a person who lives for the purpose of stoking racial hatreds. He was convicted of defaming a New York prosecutor, Steven A. Pagones, in the notorious Tawana Brawley affair, in which Brawley falsely accused Pagones of raping her. During the 1991 Crown Heights riots in Brooklyn, Sharpton fueled black rage after a Hasidic Jewish driver accidentally killed a seven-year-old black child with his car. (A young talmudic scholar, Yankel Rosenbaum, was stabbed to death by a mob shouting “Kill the Jew.”) Sharpton has made numerous anti-Semitic comments. He’s characterized black people who disagreed with him as “yellow niggers” and called white people “crackers.” He constantly casts the police as racists when there’s no evidence to support the charge. And on top of that he’s a tax cheat, having been convicted of tax evasion and, according to the New York Times, with more than $4.5 million in current state and federal tax liens against him and his for-profit businesses. Sharpton, then, is a notorious and demagogic figure. He’s anti-cop. He’s anti-Semitic. And he’s an enemy of racial reconciliation, having done incalculable damage to race relations in America. That such a loathsome individual would be allowed into the White House is itself stunning; and the fact that he’s Barack Obama’s “go-to man on race” is shameful and discrediting. These are the depths to which modern liberalism has descended. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------