Dagny's dad was a ski champion at Rollins College, so Dagny is learning how to water board and ski at age 4 from a pro.
They have a ski boat and live across the street from a lake in Maitland near Orlando. Blake will be next.
===
Controversy over the death of a Gorilla to save a 4 year old.
Meanwhile, millions of people have been slaughtered by Muslim "animals" and this gets less media attention.
As I understand it, Obama's policy regarding Muslim refugees is to ignore uncaged ISIS Gorillas joining in the flight of refugees so they eventually can roam over to America and cause comparable trouble as they have been in Europe. In fact, recently our State Department warned Americans regarding travel to Europe because of the unvetted influx of Muslims being infiltrated by these ISIS Gorillas.
Maybe Obama can resolve the ISIS crisis by hosting another "beer summit" on the grounds of The White House. Apparently that is what he demands Netanyahu do regarding Abbas and those pesky Palestinians who have taken to stabbing Israelis as their refreshing new "peace/piece" tactic.
===
If laws mean anything anymore in this nation founded upon the adherence to them, Hillarious has more problems ahead as dark clouds gather.
Democrats place winning above anything else so Hillarious could eventually be gutted by the Demwit establishment. Never put anything past politicians when power and control are the ultimate prize. Particularly, this could be the case with Obama in charge of the Justice Department. Hillary could become his sacrificial lamb.
Matters could turn so bad that even the media and news folks might be forced to save what little credibility they have left and turn against Hillarious. They did the last time around as they gushed for/over Obama and threw her overboard. (See 1, 1a, 1b and 1c below.)
That said, Thomas Friedman still continues to parse in defense of Hllary. One day he is going to break some hand bones twisting in his effort to apologize and appease his intellectual base that gush over his every word.
I was unable to copy the article but I refer you to:
Clinton’s Fibs, and Her Opponents’ Double Whoppers
By Thomas L. Friedman Op-Ed Columnist
June 1, edition of New York Times
===The Left versus Israel. (See 2 below.)
===
My friend, Bernie Marcus, stands with Trump and states why.
Bernie is one of the most practical and common sense businessmen I know. (See 3 below.)
===
Dick
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
1)Hillary’s Potential Email Felonies
While Hillary Clinton likes to appear unconcerned about her email scandal, her actions have the potential to invite serious Federal issues.
For example, when Hillary accepted donations to her Foundation she may have violated Title 18 § 201. Section (b) clearly states “Whoever -- (2) being a public official or person selected to be a public official, directly or indirectly, corruptly demands, seeks, receives, accepts or agrees to receive or accept anything of value personally or for any other person or entity, in return for: (A) being influenced in the performance of any official act; (B) being influenced to aid in committing, or to collude in, or allow, any fraud, or make opportunity of any fraud, on the United States”… The contents of the Clinton private server have yet to be fully investigated. However, if Hillary made any contact with any foreign agent or officer, such as booking speeches by Bill Clinton, she committed a Federal felony.
The FBI seem to be looking into the connections between her Charitable Foundation and her actions as Secretary of State.
And when she “allowed” Russia to control 20% of Canadian uranium in return for donations to the entity of her foundation, even indirectly, she violated §201. The penalty for each offense is to be fined or imprisoned for two years or both.
When she placed classified information on her personal server she may have violated USC 18 §798; Disclosure of classified information:
(a) “Whoever knowingly and willfully communicates, furnishes, transmits, or otherwise makes available to an unauthorized person, or publishes, or uses in any manner prejudicial to the safety or interest of the United States or for the benefit of any foreign government to the detriment of the United States any classified information --
(3) concerning the communication intelligence activities of the United States or any foreign government;
(4) obtained by the processes of communication intelligence from the communications of any foreign government, knowing the same to have been obtained by such processes…”
Note that just making this information available -- to hackers -- or using it in a manner prejudicial to safety, is a Federal crime. “Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both. “The term “classified information’ means information which, at the time of a violation of this section, is, for reasons of national security, specifically designated by a United States Government Agency for limited or restricted dissemination or distribution…” Romanian hacker Guccifer claims to have hacked into her server and has struck a plea bargain with federal prosecutors.
The existence of this server, with her approval, is itself a violation of federal law, since it was kept in an insecure manner. There are no excuses, the prosecutors won’t have to prove anything was done intentionally. For Hillary to employ a private internet tech to set up this server was itself a federal felony since it could not have been secure. Particularly since she was given a secure .gov email address and knew she had to use it exclusively for work product. High school freshmen today are instructed to submit all their homework to a very specific website maintained by their high school.
§832. Participation in nuclear and weapons of mass destruction threats to the United States
(a) “Whoever, within the United States or subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, willfully participates in or knowingly provides material support or resources (as defined in section 2339A) to a nuclear weapons program or other weapons of mass destruction program of a foreign terrorist power, or attempts or conspires to do so, shall be imprisoned for not more than 20 years.”
Hillary worked, through her private server and Clinton Foundation, to aid Russia in gaining access to uranium.
§1001. Statements or entries generally:
(a) “Except as otherwise provided in this section, whoever, in any matter within the jurisdiction of the executive, legislative, or judicial branch of the Government of the United States, knowingly and willfully --
(1) falsifies, conceals, or covers up by any trick, scheme, or device a material fact;
(2) makes any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation; or
(3) makes or uses any false writing or document knowing the same to contain any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or entry…”
§1519. Destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in Federal investigations and bankruptcy
“Whoever knowingly alters, destroys, mutilates, conceals, covers up, falsifies, or makes a false entry in any record, document, or tangible object with the intent to impede, obstruct, or influence the investigation or proper administration of any matter within the jurisdiction of any department or agency of the United States or any case filed under title….”
When Hillary said her emails only concerned yoga classes and her daughter’s wedding plans she was making fictitious statements, misrepresented the nature of the emails, and fraudulently described the nature of the emails in order to avoid investigation. She also erased over 30,000 emails. Some of those recovered contained classified information.
§2071. Concealment, removal, or mutilation generally
(b) Whoever, having the custody of any such record, proceeding, map, book, document, paper, or other thing, willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, falsifies, or destroys the same, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both; and shall forfeit his office and be disqualified from holding any office under the United States…”
§2232. (a)
(a) Destruction or Removal of Property To Prevent Seizure.—Whoever, before, during, or after any search for or seizure of property by any person authorized to make such search or seizure, knowingly destroys, damages, wastes, disposes of, transfers, or otherwise takes any action, or knowingly attempts to destroy, damage, waste, dispose of, transfer, or otherwise take any action, for the purpose of preventing or impairing the Government's lawful authority to take such property into its custody or control or to continue holding such property under its lawful custody and control, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 5 years, or both..
(b) “Impairment of In Rem Jurisdiction.—Whoever, knowing that property is subject to the in rem jurisdiction of a United States court for purposes of civil forfeiture under Federal law, knowingly and without authority from that court, destroys, damages, wastes, disposes of, transfers, or otherwise takes any action, or knowingly attempts to destroy, damage, waste, dispose of, transfer, or otherwise take any action, for the purpose of impairing or defeating the court's continuing in rem jurisdiction over the property, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 5 years, or both.”
Hillary knew her emails were being investigated and intentionally acted to obstruct the investigation.
If not for the efforts of Judge Rudolph Contreras to order the State Department to release emails, Hillary would have continued to destroy them and delay the investigation.
An interesting side note is that Hillary went to Maine South high school in Park Ridge, IL, a suburb that borders Chicago. The FBI agent who sold more secrets to Russia than any agent in history, Robert Hanssen, grew up two miles from her and went to nearby Taft High School in Chicago.
1a)
Clinton Might Not Be the Nominee
A Sanders win in California would turbocharge the mounting Democratic unease about her viability.
How could that happen, given that her nomination has been considered a sure thing by virtually everyone in the media and in the party itself? Consider the possibilities.
The inevitability behind Mrs. Clinton’s nomination will be in large measure eviscerated if she loses the June 7 California primary to Bernie Sanders. That could well happen.
A recent PPIC poll shows Mrs. Clinton with a 2% lead over Mr. Sanders, and a Fox News survey found the same result. Even a narrow win would give him 250 pledged delegates or more—a significant boost. California is clearly trending to Mr. Sanders, and the experience in recent open primaries has been that the Vermont senator tends to underperform in pre-election surveys and over-perform on primary and caucus days, thanks to the participation of new registrants and young voters.
To this end, data from mid-May show that there were nearly 1.5 million newly registered Democratic voters in California since Jan. 1. That’s a 218% increase in Democratic voter registrations compared with the same period in 2012, a strongly encouraging sign for Mr. Sanders.
A Sanders win in California would powerfully underscore Mrs. Clinton’s weakness as a candidate in the general election. Democratic superdelegates—chosen by the party establishment and overwhelmingly backing Mrs. Clinton, 543-44—would seriously question whether they should continue to stand behind her candidacy.
There is every reason to believe that at the convention Mr. Sanders will offer a rules change requiring superdelegates to vote for the candidate who won their state’s primary or caucus. A vote on that proposed change would almost certainly occur—and it would function as a referendum on the Clinton candidacy. If Mr. Sanders wins California, Montana and North Dakota on Tuesday and stays competitive in New Jersey, he could well be within 200 pledged delegates of Mrs. Clinton, making a vote in favor of the rules change on superdelegates more likely.
Another problem: In recent weeks the perception that Mrs. Clinton would be the strongest candidate against Donald Trump has evaporated. The Real Clear Politics polling average has Mrs. Clinton in a statistical tie with Mr. Trump, and recent surveys from ABC News/Washington Post and Fox News show her two and three points behind him, respectively.
Then there is that other crack in the argument for Mrs. Clinton’s inevitability: Bernie Sanders consistently runs stronger than she does against Mr. Trump nationally, beating him by about 10 points in a number of recent surveys.
The worries about Mr. Sanders’s strength have stirred the beginnings of a capitulation to him—by the Clinton camp, in league with the Democratic National Committee—at the convention. To placate him, they have already granted Mr. Sanders greater influence over the party platform. Two divisive figures, Cornel West and Rep. Keith Ellison, have been added to the platform committee, ensuring that the party will be pulled further left. In addition to putting Mr. Sanders’s socialist nostrums on display, the platform negotiations are likely to spur an ugly fight over the U.S. relationship with Israel.
Mrs. Clinton also faces growing legal problems. The State Department inspector general’s recent report on Mrs. Clinton’s use of a private email server while she was secretary of state made it abundantly clear that she broke rules and has been far from forthright in her public statements. The damning findings buttressed concerns within the party that Mrs. Clinton and her aides may not get through the government’s investigation without a finding of culpability somewhere.
With Mrs. Clinton reportedly soon to be interviewed by the FBI, suggesting that the investigation is winding up, a definitive ruling by the attorney general could be issued before the July 25 Democratic convention in Philadelphia. Given the inspector general’s report, a clean bill of health from the Justice Department is unlikely.
Finally, with Mrs. Clinton’s negative rating nearly as high as Donald Trump’s, and with voters not trusting her by a ratio of 4 to 1, Democrats face an unnerving possibility. Only a month or two ago, they were relishing the prospect of a chaotic Republican convention, with a floor fight and antiestablishment rebellion in the air. Now the messy, disastrous convention could be their own.
There are increasing rumblings within the party about how a new candidate could emerge at the convention. John Kerry, the 2004 nominee, is one possibility. But the most likely scenario is that Vice President Joe Biden—who has said that he regrets “every day” his decision not to run—enters the race.
Mr. Biden would be cast as the white knight rescuing the party, and the nation, from a possible Trump presidency. To win over Sanders supporters, he would likely choose as his running mate someone like Sen. Elizabeth Warren who is respected by the party’s left wing.
Where is President Obama in all this? So far he has largely stayed out of the campaign, other than to say that he doesn’t believe Mrs. Clinton compromised national security with her home-brew email server. But with her poll numbers dropping, her legal headaches increasing, the Sanders candidacy showing renewed vigor, and Donald Trump looming as a wrecking ball for the president’s legacy, Mr. Obama and adviser Valerie Jarrett might begin sending signals to the Democratic National Committee and to the vice president that a Biden rescue operation wouldn’t displease the White House.
All of these remain merely possibilities. But it is easier now than ever to imagine a scenario in which Hillary Clinton—whether by dint of legal or political circumstances—is not the Democratic presidential nominee.
Mr. Schoen served as a political adviser and pollster for President Bill Clinton, 1994-2000.
1b) If Clinton Implodes, Democrats May Turn to Biden and Warren
by JOHN FUND
The persistence and growth of Hillary’s e-mail scandal concerns party leaders. Smart Democrats began dusting off copies of their Plan B for the 2016 fall campaign this week. They were prompted by a devastating report from Department of Justice inspector general, who found that “significant security risks” were raised by Hillary Clinton’s decision to use a private e-mail server at the State Department.
Democrats know that an FBI report, potentially even more damaging, may be leaked in the coming weeks. Even if Hillary faces no criminal liability, she could find the number of Americans who view her as honest and trustworthy dropping below Donald Trump’s numbers.
Former Washington Post reporter Carl Bernstein, who helped break open the Watergate scandal in the 1970s, told CNN: Hillary Clinton did not want her e-mails subjected to the Freedom of Information Act or subpoenas from Congress, and that’s why she set up a home-brew server. I think we all know that. People around her will tell you that in private if you really get them behind a closed door.
I spoke to a number of top Democratic officials, and they’re terrified, including people at the White House, that her campaign is in freefall because of this distrust factor. And, indeed, Trump has a similar problem. But she’s the one whose numbers are going south.
“Trump lies about his businesses and changes with the wind,” one former Democratic senator told me. “But if Hillary is found to have compromised national security, that will be viewed as more relevant to the job of president.”
Democrats will carefully watch the polls in the next few weeks. If Hillary stays slightly ahead of Trump or is competitive, she will become the Democratic nominee at the Philadelphia convention. But if her numbers slide, watch for super-delegates now in her camp to consider the possibility of substituting Vice President Joe Biden as the Democratic candidate — with the possible addition of Senator Elizabeth Warren as his running mate, as political balm for the party’s not nominating a woman for president.
Everyone knows that the election is in the hands of independent voters, who are about 40 per cent of the electorate. In the latest CBS News/New York Times poll, 59 percent per cent of independents said that their view of Clinton was unfavorable, and 67 percent said that she was “not honest and trustworthy.”
Even liberals appear close to the end of their patience with the Clintons. The Washington Post editorial board said that the findings of the State Department report demonstrate “Clinton’s inexcusable, willful disregard for the rules.” During an MSNBC panel this Thursday, the comments were scathing as panelists ripped Hillary’s refusal to be interviewed by the inspector general and lambasted her obvious lie that her private e-mail practices were allowed by the State Department. “Trump now has ten new words for her: Incompetent Hillary, Dangerous Hillary,” former advertising brand executive Donny Deutsch said in exasperation. “I don’t know how to move the untrustworthy needle” on her, he concluded.
Mike Barnacle of MSNBC said that the report “adds to the weight of voter exhaustion when it comes to the Clintons.” Al Hunt of Bloomberg News noted that the report’s depiction of Hillary’s State Department aides as enablers for her behavior “raises questions about who she surrounds herself with.” A partial answer is that she hires people who are at least as good at stonewalling investigations as Richard Nixon ever was. Only five of the 26 current and former Clinton aides whom the inspector general sought to interview agreed to cooperate.
Clinton herself refused to be interviewed, despite having claimed on CBS’s Face the Nation as recently as May 8 that she was “more than ready to talk to anybody, anytime” about her e-mail situation. Brian Fallon, the spokesman for the Clinton campaign, preposterously tried to justify the refusal by pointing to her willingness to be interviewed by the FBI for its probe. He also tried to disparage the neutrality of the inspector general’s office by saying that there were “open questions” about the “appropriateness” of its review. He told Wolf Blitzer of CNN that “there were reports about individuals in this office coming forward and suggesting there were hints of . . . anti-Clinton bias inside that office.” When pressed for specifics, he failed to provide any.
This Is Not Business as Usual
One reason may be that the last thing Hillary Clinton really wants to talk about is how the office of the inspector general functioned during her four-year tenure at State. Astonishingly, the department had no permanent inspector general during that period, the office being filled by an acting inspector, Harold Geisel. He had been an ambassador appointed by President Bill Clinton and also had close ties to the State Department’s leadership. Those ties would have barred him from seeking the job of permanent inspector general. “It’s a convenient way to prevent oversight,” says Michael Harris, a University of Maryland professor who is an expert on the role of inspectors general in government. Acting inspectors general are “in a position where they could be removed at any moment.”
Geisel isn’t responding to calls from reporters, but the last permanent inspector general before him is. Howard Krongard served as the inspector general for State from 2005 to 2008. He told the New York Post that “it’s clear” that Hillary Clinton “did not want to be subject to internal investigations.” He believes that her actions in seeking to avoid Freedom of Information Act requests and the requirements of the Federal Records Act were clearly premeditated and intentional. That is significant because, as my NRO colleague Andrew C. McCarthy points out, violating those rules is an actual violation of federal law.
Krongard doesn’t believe Hillary Clinton is in danger of indictment from an Obama Justice Department. He believes that, even if the Justice Department were to pursue a criminal referral on the matter from the FBI, it would be plea-bargained down to a misdemeanor similar to the one that former CIA David Petraeus secured when he was found to have compromised classified information. Hillary Clinton aides have privately told allies they believe she could survive even that development if it was accompanied by a “heartfelt” apology.
Even if Hillary Clinton is capable of such a move, the FBI report into her e-mail scandal could spook Democratic delegates if the negative publicity generated by it damaged her poll numbers. And that could be a devastating political blow for Clinton. Unlike Republican delegates, who are “bound” to vote for the winner of their state’s primary or caucus on the first ballot, Democratic delegates are only “pledged” to support the winner. And they are only pledged to vote for a candidate if they can do so “in good conscience.” One Democratic super-delegate I spoke with joked that the political definition of that phrase is “can they win in November.”
If Democratic delegates decide that Hillary is too much of a political liability to nominate, don’t expect them to turn to Bernie Sanders. Despite polls showing him with a bigger lead over Trump than Hillary has, few prominent Democrats believe that Sanders could survive sustained attacks on his record as a self-proclaimed “socialist.”
That’s where Joe Biden and Elizabeth Warren would come in. Biden would be sold as a steady hand who would energize President Obama’s supporters, and Warren would be pitched to delegates as someone who could keep Sanders progressives on board. “The implication would be that, at age 74, Biden might serve only one term and Warren would be a natural successor,’ a former Democratic congressman told me.
Senior Clinton adviser Joel Berenson insists that the American people have no interest in what he calls the “gray area” of Hillary Clinton’s e-mail situation. Senator Claire McCaskill (D., Mo.), who is a staunch Hillaryite, told MSNBC that voters will think that she merely made “a mistake trying to protect her privacy.” But that’s not what smart Democrats are privately saying. They know that the inspector general’s report is a preview of coming revelations in the upcoming FBI report, and they are laying the groundwork to implement Plan B if they think it will be necessary.
John Fund is NRO’s national-affairs correspondent.
1c) Dark clouds gather over Hillary Clinton
By Don Metcalf
Dan Metcalfe teaches secrecy law at American University’s Washington College of Law. He served as Director of the Justice Department’s Office of Information and Privacy for more than 25 years, during which time he handled information-disclosure policy issues on dozens of Clinton Administration scandals. He’s a registered Democrat who says he will vote for Hillary Clinton in November “if she escapes indictment and manages to become the Democratic presidential nominee.”
Metcalfe believes, however, that Clinton will be indicted, and should be, over the email scandal. He explains why in this column.
Metcalfe writes:
For those of us who recognized from the outset that Ms. Clinton’s exclusive use of a personal email system for all her official business (not to mention her unprecedented use of a private server atop that) was a clear violation of the Federal Records Act (“FRA”), the findings of the State Department’s Inspector General (“IG”) to that effect in his May 25 report were no surprise. In fact, on the admitted facts of the case, no other conclusion was possible, and it was simply another “shoe waiting to be dropped.”For Metcalfe, the primary significance of the IG’s Report “is that it so flatly and persuasively belies nearly every public ‘defense’ that she has uttered on the matter”:
No, her self-serving email set-up was not “allowed” under the State Department’s rules. No, she was not “permitted” to use a personal email system exclusively as she did. No, what she did was hardly just a matter of her “personal convenience.” No, there is no evidence that any State Department attorney (other than perhaps Secretary Clinton herself) ever gave “legal approval” to any part of her special email system. No, everything she did was not “fully above board” or in compliance with the “letter and spirit of the rules,” far from it.
Yes, she was indeed required by the FRA to maintain all official emails in an official system for proper review, delineation, and retention upon her departure. Yes, her private server equipment was in fact the subject of multiple attempted intrusion attempts (i.e., hacks), including by foreign nations.
The list goes on and on. (Note that this does not even include Ms. Clinton’s many serious “misstatements” about her handling of classified or potentially classified information.)And, yes, an indictment is warranted:
[T]he most likely Democrat nominee, having just been seriously wounded by this week’s IG report, is manifestly vulnerable to a much greater wound in the form of a criminal indictment for misconduct that far transcends what the IG report dealt with. . . .
Former Secretary Clinton’s intent. . .is not what matters in this case. Rather, the applicable legal standard is a mere “gross negligence” one, as specified in the standard national security non-disclosure agreement that she signed and its underlying criminal statutes.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++And when you marry that to the fact that (among other things) her admitted failure to use the State Department’s special classified email system for classified (or potentially classified) information constituted a clear violation of a criminal prohibition, you start worrying big-time. And this is especially so given that Ms. Clinton did not just violate such laws inadvertently or even only occasionally — she did so systemically. In other words, her very email scheme itself appears to have been a walking violation of criminal law, one with the mens rea prosecution standard readily met.Like everyone I know who has worked with FBI Director James Comey, Metcalfe considers him a man of “the utmost integrity.” Accordingly, Metcalfe says:
Given that the facts and law are so clear in Ms. Clinton’s case, it is difficult to imagine her not being indicted, unless Jim Comey’s expected recommendation for that is abruptly overruled at “Main Justice” (i.e., by Criminal Division Assistant Attorney General Leslie Caldwell, by Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, or by Attorney General Loretta Lynch) or at the White House by President Obama (who customarily does not intervene in such things and would do so here either secretly or at no small political peril).My view is that, more likely than not, a Comey recommendation to prosecute would be overruled at Main Justice. One way or another, however, the IG’s report signals stormy weather for Hillary Clinton
2)The Left. vs. Israel
by Daniel Pipes: The Washington Times
Since the creation of Israel, Palestinians, Arabs, and Muslims have been the mainstay of anti-Zionism, with the Left, from the Soviet Union to professors of literature, their auxiliary. But this might be in process of change: as Muslims slowly, grudgingly, and unevenly come to accept the Jewish state as a reality, the Left is becoming increasingly vociferous and obsessive in its rejection of Israel.
But the composition of those voting blocs renders the decision noteworthy. Votes in favor includedevery state in Europe except two, Bosnia-Herzegovina (which has a half-Muslim population) and San Marino (total population: 33,000), both of which missed the vote for reasons unknown to me.
Much evidence points in this direction: Polls in the Middle East find cracks in the opposition to Israel while a major American survey for the first time shows liberal Democrats to be more anti-Israel than pro-Israel. The Saudi and Egyptian governments have real security relations with Israel while a figure like (the Jewish) Bernie Sanders declares that "to the degree that [Israelis] want us to have a positive relationship, I think they're going to have to improve their relationship with the Palestinians."
But I should like to focus on a small illustrative example from a United Nations institution: The World Health Organization churned out report A69/B/CONF./1 on May 24 with the enticing title, "Health conditions in the occupied Palestinian territory, including east Jerusalem, and in the occupied Syrian Golan: Draft decision proposed by the delegation of Kuwait, on behalf of the Arab Group, and Palestine."
The Left is becoming increasingly vociferous and obsessive in its rejection of Israel.
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The three-page document calls for "a field assessment conducted by the World Health Organization," with special focus on such topics as "incidents of delay or denial of ambulance service" and "access to adequate health services on the part of Palestinian prisoners." Of course, the entire document singles out Israel as a denier of unimpeded access to health care.
This ranks as a special absurdity given the WHO's hiring a consultant in next-door Syria who is connected to the very pinnacle of the Assad regime, even as it perpetrates atrocities estimated at a half million dead and 12 million displaced (out of a total pre-war population of 22 million).
Mahmoud Abbas (left) and Ismail Haniyeh (right), pictured in March 2007, both had close relatives go for medical treatments in Israel.
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Conversely, both the wife and brother-in-law of Mahmoud Abbas, leader of the Palestinian Authority, whose status and wealth assures them treatment anywhere in the world, chose to be treated in Israeli hospitals, as did the sister, daughter, and grand-daughter of Ismail Haniyeh, the Hamas leader in Gaza, Israel's sworn enemy.
Despite these facts, the WHO voted on May 28 to accept the proposed field assessment with the predictably lopsided outcome of 107 votes in favor, 8 votes against, 8 abstentions and 58 absences. So far, all this is tediously routine.
But the composition of those voting blocs renders the decision noteworthy. Votes in favor includedevery state in Europe except two, Bosnia-Herzegovina (which has a half-Muslim population) and San Marino (total population: 33,000), both of which missed the vote for reasons unknown to me.
To repeat: Every other European government than those two supported a biased field assessment with its inevitable condemnation of Israel. To be specific, this included the authorities ruling in Albania, Andorra, Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Moldova, Monaco, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.
All but two European governments voted to support a biased field assessment with its inevitable condemnation of Israel.
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Making this European near-unanimity the more remarkable were the many absented governments with large- to overwhelming-majority-Muslim populations: Burkina Faso, Chad, Côte d'Ivoire, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Kyrgyzstan, Libya, Mozambique, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Togo, and Turkmenistan.
So, Iceland (with effectively no Muslims) voted for the amendment and against Israel while Turkmenistan (which is over 90 percent Muslim) did not. Cyprus and Greece, which have critical new relations with Israel, voted against Israel while the historically hostile Libyans missed the vote. Germany, with its malignant history, voted against Israel while Tajikistan, a partner of the Iranian regime's, was absent. Denmark, with its noble history, voted against Israel while Sudan, led by an Islamist, did not.
This unlikely pattern suggests that monolithic Muslim hostility is cracking while Europeans, who are overwhelmingly on the Left, to the point that even right-wing parties pursue watered-down left-wing policies, increasingly despise Israel. Worse, even those who do not share this attitude go along with it, even in an obscure WHO vote.
Muslims, not leftists, still staff almost all the violent attacks on Israel; and Islamism, not socialism, remains the reigning anti-Zionist ideology. But these changes point to Israel's cooling relations with the West and warming ones in its neighborhood.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
3)
Why I Stand With Donald Trump
As a backer of former Republican presidential candidates, I now stand in support of Donald J. Trump because the fate of this nation depends upon sending him, and not Hillary Clinton, to the White House
.
I know Donald Trump, but we’re not close friends. However, I believe he will begin on Day One undoing the damage done by President Barack Obama. I stand ready to help him at every turn.
Like many, I am deeply concerned about the US Supreme Court. When Trump recently released his list of potential appointees, I grew confident in his resolve to keep our court balanced. Even more important: Clinton will push the court leftward for generations. She must be stopped.
But I draw even more from lessons learned when we founded The Home Depot in 1978 rather than from the contentious GOP primary of 2016. I genuinely believe that if we to started The Home Depot today, we would fail because of the hurdles government, especially the current administration, places in front of small business owners. I never forget The Home Depot’s small business roots – we started as a small business with four stores in Atlanta, Georgia.
I think of the banker who nearly lost his job by taking a risk and giving us a line of credit when we started. He didn’t just look at our balance sheet; he believed in our character and determination. Government regulators don’t allow this under Dodd-Frank – a law Hillary Clinton wants to make far worse
And going public under Sarbanes-Oxley, a Clinton favorite? Not the company we built, nor thousands of other businesses like ours the nation will never know because they died at birth, strangled by faceless bureaucrats and politicians who erroneously believe that government “can do it better.”
Yet the risks we took in the 1970s have resulted in millions of jobs – not just at The Home Depot, but at our suppliers, our vendors, and even our customers’ businesses. Investors believed in us, and the government did not stop us.
We could not do this today, for the same reason why so many Americans have dropped out of the workforce, why their wages have been stagnant, why their health care is a mess, and why our economy has stalled. It’s Obama/Clinton-style government that’s getting in the way.
I have never seen our government as hostile to free enterprise, especially small business, as it is today. It is driving over-regulation, over-taxation, over-litigation, and over-spending. These “overs” are killing small businesses, which create the majority of new jobs in America.
Politicians like Obama and Clinton, aided by the media and academia, have peddled a dangerous sentiment that government can provide for Americans better than the private sector. That’s not just false, it’s likely the nexus of Trump’s massively popular slogan, “Make America Great Again.” We saw it first hand.
The vast majority of early Home Depot associates did not have a college education. But they worked hard and were paid with salaries and stock options. Those options made many people wealthy, and fueled our robust growth.
One young man started with us at 17 years of age, bringing carts in from the parking lot. Ultimately, he became a regional president. Imagine Americans vilifying this young man, who became a millionaire and earned every penny of it.
What makes America great? Risk, preparation, hard work, and a young man’s willingness to shag carts from a parking lot because he has faith that he and his family can be great.
Donald Trump is right: To inspire more of these men and women, we must make America great again. Record-breaking numbers of Republican primary voters agree. They overwhelmingly want Donald Trump to lead this sea change, and we believe he can. But he needs to stand on our shoulders; he cannot do it alone.
One of the greatest lessons we took away from The Home Depot is to always listen to your customers. Without their input, we surely would have failed. Republican leaders must listen to their customers, too – their voters – and they have spoken clearly.
As Americans, the choice is abundantly clear: If you want four more years of President Obama, vote for Hillary Clinton; if you want to take the country in a new direction, vote for Donald Trump.
Make no mistake, Republicans who refuse to stand behind their party’s nominee are electing Clinton, whether they cast their ballots for her or not. I have a message for the #NeverTrump crowd: Enough already. Donald Trump is our presumptive nominee and it is time to get over wishing it were not so. If you don’t, change your social media hashtag to #HillaryGOP.
As a GOP donor who stood steadfastly behind Jeb Bush – and who has contributed to candidates for a generation – I urge all Republicans to stand up and be counted in support for Donald Trump.
