Obama's Legacy About To Be Shredded? Hillary Elected President of Hollywood.

Blake,Stella, Dagny

Abby, Lynn, Daniel, Stella,Blake,Dagny Brian at DisneyWorld.

Dagny, Stella, Blake and     Blake, Stella, Daniel, Dagny
Brian at Sea World               and G'Pa Shpilberg at Disney World





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My courageous Israeli Arab reporter friend discusses Iran's increased confidence they have gotten the best of Obama. (See 1 below.)
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Obama is about to have Obamacare radically modified. He is about to see his Cuba recognition policy put to the test and he is seeing his Iran Deal come under continuing fire.

In essence, Obama's legacy is getting ready to be shredded and being thin skinned and an egoist will he stick it to Netanyahu before leaving office and recognize The Palestinians as a nation?  Stay tuned. (See 2 below.)
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Tommy V. Wier is in the process of producing a documentary film about those who helped Birmingham change its form of government and, in the process, were able to oust "Bull" Connor, the city's racist Police Chief. My father and several members of his law firm , along with other leaders, were involved.  This is a short trailer that Tom was kind enough to have forwarded to me: "I have a website for the film:  www.directactionfilm.com that you can visit. Please pass on this link to ... Richard Berkowitz."

The word racist is being thrown around today with abandon.  The "Bull" was the epitome of a racist.
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How anyone in their right mind can pay homage to Castro is beyond me. Had they lived under this thug's rule and understood the clear meaning of standing in the other person's shoes perhaps they would come to a different conclusion. (See 3 below.)

The same is true regarding what is happening on college campuses.  Those who endorse relativism have gone overboard in justifying insanity and hypocrisy.  Save me from the PC do gooders who have turned the world upside down when it comes to their sense of morality. 

Liberals are so easily swayed by false causes because, to them, everyone is an underdog who needs saving at the expense of those they deem blameworthy.  How macabre can you get? (See 3a below.)
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Hillary was elected president of Hollywood.  (See 4 below.)
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Dick
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1) Iran, Hamas and the Dance of Death by Khaled Abu Toameh

• It now appears that the Obama Administration’s failed policies in the Middle East have increased the Iranians’ appetite, such that they are convinced that they can expand their influence to the Palestinians as well.
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• Iran has one goal only: to eliminate the “Zionist entity” and undermine moderate and progressive Arabs and Muslims.
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• “Relations between Iran and Hamas are currently undergoing revitalization, and are moving in the right direction,” announced Osama Hamdan, a senior Hamas official. He went on to explain that “moving in the right direction” means that Iran would “continue to support the resistance” against Israel.
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• Hamas and Iran have no meaningful ideological or strategic differences. Both share a common desire to destroy Israel and replace it with an Islamic empire. Iran expects results: Hamas is to use the financial and military support to resume attacks on Israel and “liberate all of Palestine, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea.”
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• As far as Iran is concerned, there is nothing better than having two proxy terror organizations on Israel’s borders — Hezbollah in the north and Hamas in the south.
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• The biggest losers, once again, will be President Mahmoud Abbas and his Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.
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• Israel’s presence in the West Bank has thus far thwarted Iran’s repeated attempts to establish bases of power there.
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The Iranians and Hamas are exploiting the final days of the Obama Administration to restore their relations and pave the way for Tehran to step up its meddling in the internal affairs of the Palestinians in particular and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in general.

Emboldened by the nuclear deal framework with the world powers, Iran has already taken the liberty of interfering in the internal affairs of other Arabs, particularly the Iraqis, Lebanese, Syrians, Yemenites and some Gulf countries.

It now appears that the Obama Administration’s failed policies in the Middle East have increased the Iranians’ appetite such that they are convinced that they can expand their influence to the Palestinians as well.

Thanks to the civil war in Syria, relations between Hamas and Iran have been strained over the past few years. Hamas’s refusal to support the regime of Bashar Assad — Iran’s chief ally in the region — has led the Iranians to suspend financial and military aid to the Islamist movement in the Gaza Strip. However, recent signs indicate that Iran and Hamas are en route to a kind of Danse Macabre — a move that will undoubtedly allow Tehran to become a major player in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Iran used to funnel money to Hamas because the terrorist group shares Iran’s desire to destroy Israel and replace it with an Islamic empire. Relations between Iran and Hamas foundered a few years back, when Hamas leaders refused to support the Iranian-backed Syrian dictator, Bashar Assad. Pictured above: Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal (left) confers with Iranian “Supreme Leader” Ali Khamenei, in 2010. (Image source: Office of the Supreme Leader)

This, of course, bodes badly for any future peace process between Israel and the Palestinians. Iran has one goal only: to eliminate the “Zionist entity” and undermine moderate and progressive Arabs and Muslims.

The new US administration would do well to take very seriously Iran’s comeback to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, because of its implications not only concerning prospects for peace, but also because it means that this will lead to an upsurge in violence and terror attacks against Israel.

Proof of Iran’s renewed effort to infiltrate the Palestinian arena was provided this week by statements made by a senior Hamas official, Osama Hamdan, who is in charge of the Islamist movement’s “external affairs.” Asked about Hamas’s relations with Iran, Hamdan was quoted as saying that he had good reason to be optimistic.

“Relations between Iran and Hamas are currently undergoing revitalization, and are moving in the right direction,” Hamdan announced. He went on to explain that “moving in the right direction” means that Iran would “continue to support the resistance” against Israel. “Relations between Iran and Hamas extend over a period of 25 years,” he added. “Undoubtedly, any flaw in this relationship has a negative impact. But this relationship is capable of renewing itself. This is a relationship that is based on supporting the resistance and the Palestinian cause.”

In reality, Hamas and Iran have no meaningful ideological or strategic differences. Both share a common desire to destroy Israel and replace it with an Islamic empire. The two entities are also committed to an “armed struggle” against Israel, and are vehemently opposed to any compromise with it.

The crisis between the two sides over the civil war in Syria is no more than a minor, tactical dispute. When it comes to the real agenda, such as destroying Israel and launching terror attacks, Iran and Hamas continue to be in total alignment.

Another sign of the apparent rapprochement between Iran and Hamas came in the form of reports that the Islamist movement has appointed a new leader in the Gaza Strip with close ties to Tehran. According to the reports, Emad El Alami, who previously served as Hamas’s first emissary to Tehran, has been entrusted with temporarily replacing Ismail Haniyeh as the ruler of the Gaza Strip. Haniyeh has in recent months relocated from the Gaza Strip to Qatar. At this stage, it remains unclear when and if Haniyeh will return to the Gaza Strip. Some Palestinians have surmised that Haniyeh may replace the Doha-based Khaled Mashaal as head of the Hamas “Political Bureau.” If this happens, then El Alami, who is regarded by many Palestinians as Iran’s agent, will become the permanent de facto ruler of the Gaza Strip.

El Alami’s rise to power will undoubtedly further facilitate Iran’s ambition to become a significant player in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through the gates of the Gaza Strip. This means that Hamas can expect more cash and weapons to enter Gaza in the coming weeks and months. Such an influx would significantly increase the likelihood of another war between Hamas and Israel. Iran’s millions will not be used by Hamas for building schools and hospitals, or providing desperately needed jobs for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Nor will the Iranian-supplied weapons be stored in Hamas warehouses and tunnels, or used in military parades.

Iran expects results: Hamas is to use the financial and military support to resume attacks on Israel and “liberate all of Palestine, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea.”

When Hamas leaders talk about Iranian support for the Palestinian “resistance”, they mean suicide bombings, rocket attacks and other forms of terrorism. They are saying with unmistakable clarity that they seek a resumption of Iranian support for the “resistance” – not for the tens of thousands of unemployed and impoverished Palestinians living under the Hamas regime in the Gaza Strip. The wellbeing of the Palestinians living under its rule is the last thing on Hamas’s mind.

The Iranians, for their part, appear to be extremely eager to resume their role as enablers and funders of any group that vows to eliminate Israel. As far as Iran is concerned, there is nothing better than having two proxy terror organizations on Israel’s borders – Hezbollah in the north and Hamas in the south.

Iran is already backing other terror groups in the Gaza Strip, such as the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Al Sabereen. But these are tiny groups compared to Hamas, which has tens of thousands of gunmen and a strong military group, Ezaddin Al Kassam. And there is nothing to prevent Iran from extending its control to the Gaza Strip through Hamas, especially in the wake of the Obama Administration’s policy of appeasing not only the Iranians, but also the Muslim Brotherhood.

In the coming months, Hamas is scheduled to hold secret elections to elect a replacement for Khaled Mashaal. Mashaal’s departure from the scene is also set to facilitate Iran’s effort to infiltrate the Gaza Strip. The three candidates who are seen as potential successors to Mashaal – Ismail Haniyeh, Musa Abu Marzouk and Yehya Al Sinwar – have all pledged to improve their movement’s ties with Iran.

The biggest losers, once again, will be President Mahmoud Abbas and his Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.

PA officials continue to express deep concern over Iran’s meddling in Palestinian affairs, especially its financial and military support for terror groups in the Gaza Strip and even some parts of the West Bank. Yet Israel’s presence in the West Bank has thus far thwarted Iran’s repeated attempts to establish bases of power there. Abbas has no choice but to work with Israel if he wishes to prevent Iran and its supporters from overthrowing his regime, and perhaps dragging him to the center of Ramallah and hanging him as a traitor.

Abbas and his senior aides are nonetheless plenty worried about Iran’s increased efforts to infiltrate the Palestinian arena. At a lecture in Bahrain last week, PLO Secretary-General Saeb Erekat sounded an alarm bell when he said:

“Iran has no right to interfere in the internal affairs of the Palestinians. Iran must respect the particularity of our country. We hope that Iran will focus on placing Palestine back on the map and not intervene through this or that group.”

But this warning is likely to fall on deaf ears in the waning Obama Administration, which obviously no longer shares the widespread concern among Arabs and Palestinians that Iran remains a major threat to stability and security in the region, including Israel. Perhaps the new US administration will see Iran and its machinations a bit more clearly. The alternative is allowing Iran and its proxy terror groups further to drench the region in blood.

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2)

As Trump Charts New Mideast Policy, White House Contemplates Sabotage

By Gregg Roman  After their first meeting, with cameras broadcasting their every word across the globe, President Obama turned to Donald Trump and pledged "to do everything we can to help you succeed." Media outlets across the spectrum fawned over his magnanimity. Guess again. Washington DC insiders widely expect the president to launch a bold effort to constrain the president-elect's options in dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by supporting unilateral international recognition of Palestinian statehood, possibly in the UN Security Council. U.S. policy has long maintained that a Palestinian state should be established in conjunction with a comprehensive peace settlement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA). While Israel has said time and time again that it is eager to live alongside a Palestinian state, the Palestinian leadership has remained unwilling to make the necessary concessions for a final status agreement, such as accepting the existence of a Jewish state alongside their own. Indeed, PA President Mahmoud Abbas has steadfastly maintained that millions of Palestinians must have the "right of return" to Israel – a move that would effectively eviscerate a Jewish Israel. Instead of pursuing a peaceful path to statehood, Palestinian leaders have incited violence against Israel, while trying to persuade the rest of the world to recognize Palestinian statehood in the absence of peace. Amid surging anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism, European governments have come under intense pressure to recognize a Palestinian state. Swedenwas the first Western European government to do so in 2014. Legislatures in the United Kingdom, Spain, and France have passed (largely non-binding) resolutions doing so. Successive U.S. administrations have vocally opposed unilateral recognition of Palestinian statehood by the United Nations and other international actors, maintaining correctly that it would irreparably damage the prospects for a viable, secure two-state solution. In a position paper released last week, the Trump campaign emphasized that "the U.S. cannot support the creation of a new state where terrorism is financially incentivized, terrorists are celebrated by political parties and government institutions, and the corrupt diversion of foreign aid is rampant," pledged to veto any UN action that unfairly targets Israel, and affirmed that Palestinians must first "renounce violence against Israel or recognize Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state" before being granted statehood. In seeking to overturn longstanding precedent and thwart the expressed policy positions of his successor, Obama presumably hopes that supporting (or not vetoing) a UN Security Council resolution on Palestinian statehood will create an irreversible fait accompli that will eventually spur Israel to make concessions, like a settlement freeze, which will in turn strengthen moderates on the Palestinian side. Unilateral statehood recognition communicates to Palestinian leaders that they don't need to concede anything. It's the same thinking that led the United States to make concession after concession in the Iran nuclear deal, and it is likely to backfire in the same way. Unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state will communicate to Palestinian leaders that they do not need to concede anything and validate the use and incitement of violence, vindicating hardliners. Until the Palestinian leadership can recognize and accept a Jewish state in the land of Israel, the United States must continue working to prevent international recognition of a Palestinian state. A Trump national security adviser warned the Obama administration last week not "to try to push through agenda items that are contrary to the president-elect's positions." President-elect Trump should follow up by publicly reaffirming that his administration will vigorously oppose unilateral recognition of Palestinian statehood and will not be bound by commitments the current administration has made or will make regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The rest of us should do our part by calling on President Obama to respect the will of voters and allow his duly-elected successor to chart a new course in Mideast policy without any impediments. Gregg Roman is director of the Middle East Forum. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 3) Farewell to Cuba’s brutal Big Brother By Carlos Eire   One of the most brutal dictators in modern history has just died. Oddly enough, some will mourn his passing, and many an obituary will praise him. Millions of Cubans who have been waiting impatiently for this moment for more than half a century will simply ponder his crimes and recall the pain and suffering he caused. Why this discrepancy? Because deceit was one of Fidel Castro’s greatest talents, and gullibility is one of the world’s greatest frailties. A genius at myth-making, Castro relied on the human thirst for myths and heroes. His lies were beautiful, and so appealing. According to Castro and to his propagandists, the so-called revolution was not about creating a repressive totalitarian state and securing his rule as an absolute monarch, but rather about eliminating illiteracy, poverty, racism, class differences and every other ill known to humankind. This bold lie became believable, thanks largely to Castro’s incessant boasting about free schools and medical care, which made his myth of the benevolent utopian revolution irresistible to many of the world’s poor. Many intellectuals, journalists and educated people in the First World fell for this myth, too — though they would have been among the first to be jailed or killed by Castro in his own realm — and their assumptions acquired an intensity similar to that of religious convictions. Pointing out to such believers that Castro imprisoned, tortured and murdered thousands more of his own people than any other Latin American dictator was usually futile. His well-documented cruelty made little difference, even when acknowledged, for he was judged according to some aberrant ethical code that defied logic. This Kafkaesque moral disequilibrium had a touch of magical realism, for sure, as outrageously implausible as anything that Castro’s close friend Gabriel García Márquez could dream up. For instance, in 1998, around the same time that Chile’s ruler Augusto Pinochet was arrested in London for his crimes against humanity, Cuba’s self-anointed “maximum leader” visited Spain with ample fanfare, unmolested, even though his human rights abuses dwarfed those of Pinochet. Even worse, whenever Castro traveled abroad, many swooned in his presence. In 1995, when he came to New York to speak at the United Nations, many of the leading lights of that city jostled so intently for a chance to meet with him at media mogul Mort Zuckerman’s triplex penthouse on Fifth Avenue that Time magazine declared “Fidel Takes Manhattan!” Not to be outdone, Newsweek called Castro “The Hottest Ticket in Manhattan.” None of the American elites who hobnobbed with Castro that day seemed to care that he had put nuclear weapons to their heads in 1962. If this were a just world, 13 facts would be etched on Castro’s tombstone and highlighted in every obituary, as bullet points — a fitting metaphor for someone who used firing squads to murder thousands of his own people. ●He turned Cuba into a colony of the Soviet Union and nearly caused a nuclear holocaust. ●He sponsored terrorism wherever he could and allied himself with many of the worst dictators on earth. ●He was responsible for so many thousands of executions and disappearances in Cuba that a precise number is hard to reckon. ●He brooked no dissent and built concentration camps and prisons at an unprecedented rate, filling them to capacity, incarcerating a higher percentage of his own people than most other modern dictators, including Stalin. ●He condoned and encouraged torture and extrajudicial killings. ●He forced nearly 20 percent of his people into exile, and prompted thousands to meet their deaths at sea, unseen and uncounted, while fleeing from him in crude vessels. ●He claimed all property for himself and his henchmen, strangled food production and impoverished the vast majority of his people. ●He outlawed private enterprise and labor unions, wiped out Cuba’s large middle class and turned Cubans into slaves of the state. ●He persecuted gay people and tried to eradicate religion. ●He censored all means of expression and communication. ●He established a fraudulent school system that provided indoctrination rather than education, and created a two-tier health-care system, with inferior medical care for the majority of Cubans and superior care for himself and his oligarchy, and then claimed that all his repressive measures were absolutely necessary to ensure the survival of these two ostensibly “free” social welfare projects. ●He turned Cuba into a labyrinth of ruins and established an apartheid society in which millions of foreign visitors enjoyed rights and privileges forbidden to his people. ●He never apologized for any of his crimes and never stood trial for them. In sum, Fidel Castro was the spitting image of Big Brother in George Orwell’s novel “1984.” So, adiós, Big Brother, king of all Cuban nightmares. And may your successor, Little Brother, soon slide off the bloody throne bequeathed to him. Carlos Eire is an author and the T.L. Riggs Professor of History and Religious Studies at Yale University 3a)  Campus War Against Israel and Jews The new book Dispatches from the Campus War Against Israel & Jews by Richard Cravatts, published by the David Horowitz Freedom Center, expertly explores and explains this alarming phenomenon. He covers the ideological roots of academic Jew-hatred, the BDS movement, Students for Justice in Palestine, the demonization of Israel, the “altruistic evil” of social justice, and more. Dr. Richard Cravatts has written over 400 articles and book chapters on a wide range of topics from campus anti-Semitism and free speech to real estate and social policy in such publications as the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, Christian Science Monitor, and Chicago Tribune,. He is the author of Genocidal Liberalism: The University’s War Against Israel & Jews. He is a past-president of Scholars for Peace in the Middle East and a board member of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under the Law, and the Journal for the Study of Antisemitism. I reached out to Dr. Cravatts with some questions about his important new book. Mark Tapson: Can you explain how two influential buzzwords of academia – diversity and multiculturalism – have contributed to the ramping up of anti-Israelism on campus? Richard Cravatts: Thanks so much for the opportunity to speak with you and your readers. The desire to achieve diversity on campuses has seen administrations bending over backward to accommodate the sensitivities of minorities and perceived victims of the majority culture—usually at the expense of fairness and rationality. And multiculturalism has brought with it a type of moral relativism in which every country or victim group is equal, regardless of what vagaries, weaknesses, or fundamental evil may underpin its social structure. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

4)Clinton’s lead in the popular vote nationwide was about 1.7 million. 

 

But, Clinton’s lead in California alone was 3.5 million. Hillary’s entire margin of popular votes comes from one state: California.

 

As one wag put it: In effect, Hillary was elected president of California and Trump was elected president of the rest of the country by a substantial margin.

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