A Divided Nation Cannot Stand. Our anti-Semitic State Department. Dagny Hires A Lawyer. This Is The Week God Decides - Hef Did Not Make It.

Even if this is staged, like the surreptitious visit to the abortion clinics several years ago, the video makes valid points about the divisiveness on college campus' today.  A divided nation cannot stand and that is what fascism is all about. https://www.facebook.com/ihypocrite/videos/785702621613506/
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No divided nation will long stand.  This is why fascists want America divided.  This is also why discord on college campuses is one of their essential goals.  This is why the decimation of a nation's basic education is also their goal and this is why a nation that has no common language is also their goal and this is why a nation that cannot protect its borders is one of their primary goals.

The spread of chaos is critical to their success. An orderly and united society, respecting the rule of law, is the anarchist's  greatest threat. The more you divide a society, the more a society loses faith in itself and its values and the more a society's political system resorts to identity politics the more likely that society will fail.  This is why political correctness has become a driving force, this is why those who hate capitalism, our nation's flag and anthem engage in defiant acts allegedly in support of a myriad of espoused causes. Many of these causes are questionable and simply serve as a rallying cry for anarchy.

I served on the Board of Governors of St John's College for eight, years, as many may know. St John's began as St Mary's College and was initially Church Affiliated.  It is the third oldest institution of higher learning in our nation.  Francis Scott Key founded the Alumni Association.  He would be turning over in his grave today.

Well over 70 years ago, St John's embraced, as its core curriculum, the profound studies of the "Great Books" and adopted Mortimer Adler's liberal arts concept when it was no longer taught at The University of Chicago.

St John's is a talking school and believes in exposing its students to reasoned and respectful discourse.  Unlike on so many of today's campuses, where those whose views are opposed for fear of their lives and/or are not allowed to speak because they are heckled and disrupted, St John's is open to all views and invites all to challenge opposing thoughts.

St John's Annapolis Campus (their second campus is in Santa Fe) is  literally located across the street from The Naval Academy. During The Viet Nam, tensions grew between the two student bodies so a Johnny decided a croquet match would be an acceptable way of lowering the divisiveness.  The match continues to this day and The Johnny's hold the edge for wins.

America would be well advised to increase the number of St John's and Hillsdale curricula being taught today.  This is what Savannah's Classical Academy is all about and has been doing successfully since its beginning but is on probation because it's student body has not been exposed to regurgitating rote facts bordering on nonsense and  dictated by The State of Georgia.  Why? Because unions are threatened by Charter Schools yet, parents seem undeterred because SAC has a waiting list of over 900 for less than 50 available seats.  Parents know better than liberal controlled politically correct union bosses whose sole interest is power not education and the welfare of students. This is why Sec. of  Education De Vos is hated.  Not because she is against education and is incompetent but because she is effective and cares about our nation's education and those unable to go to private school.  She believes they are better served by choice and free market competition.  

Because De Vos is conservative, liberals are compelled to hate her, to attack her, to spread lies about her, to bring her down. This is what identity politics is all about. If you have no suitable, logical and valid response attack the person.

The recent intrusion of politics on playing fields is not of Trump's doing.  Yes, he boorishly, injected himself into the fray but as president he has a responsibility to speak for those who are intimidated by the chaos crowd and I commend him for doing so but recognize his rhetoric often becomes his undoing because the wolves  are out to attack anything he does and says.  Today it is his response in Puerto Rico and who knows what tomorrow brings.

I would like to believe America will right its ship of state but fear the dye is cast and we are well along the path of losing our precious freedoms.  It is never too late to stand against anarchists but the longer we wait the more difficult the effort and greater the chance of failure.

As I oft write - Pogo said it all - The Enemy is Us! Stand Up America - heal thyself! (See 1 below.)
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Our State Department is loaded with Ivy League intellectuals and elitists.  It is a net work of "good old boys."  It has always been a white shoe crowd with a bias towards Israel and Jews in general.

That is my belief and I am sticking to it. (See 2  and 2a below.)
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This from a dear friend and fellow memo reader: (See 3 below.)
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This from a very dear friend and fellow memo reader regarding Dagny's Puerto Rico fund raiser: "Dick, does  Dagny  have a certificate from the health dept, a business license, listing from the BBB, and a menu in both English and Spanish? Her application for these documents should be approved by the time she is 18. Seriously, best of luck and success in this business venture.

B----"

I responded no, she only hired a good lawyer.

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During this week, in the Jewish tradition, God decided who shall live and who shall die in the year 5778.  Hef did not make it.

  

I hope you and all your respective families, including my own, do.

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Dick
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1) Alan Dershowitz: On Israel, Many Professors ‘Use the Classroom as a Propaganda Podium’

by Shiri Moshe

Retired Harvard University law professor Alan Dershowitz on Wednesday encouraged university students not to back down from difficult discussions surrounding Israel on campus, urging them to make complex, cogent cases rooted in history when faced with propagandistic attacks.

Dershowitz, an advocate of the two-state solution and critic of Israeli settlements, was invited to speak at Columbia University by the local chapter of Students Supporting Israel on the First Amendment and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. While organizers expected his talk to be interrupted by groups including Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace, it ultimately proceeded without incident.

Touching on some of the tensions leading up to his appearance, Dershowtiz observed that “the one issue that is very hard to have a serious, nuanced discussion on at a university campus today is Israel.” He contended that too many professors “use the classroom as a propaganda podium,” teaching students not how to think, but what to think.

Dershowitz urged students not to answer this “propagandistic, anti-Israel speech” with “propagandistic, pro-Israel speech.”

“That is an ineffective way of responding to propaganda,” he said. “The appropriate response is calibrated, nuanced, carefully thought through, accurate, historical, and moral statements that acknowledge [Israel’s] faults.”

Dershowitz noted that despite the routine and egregious abuses committed by countries such as Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Belarus, Russia, and various others, some polls still suggest that a “significant number” of university students in the United States believe that Israel is the world’s top human rights violator.

Nonetheless, the professor argued that “Israel in 70 years of existence has contributed more to the world than any country in history in so short a period of time.”

“I think Israel has among the best human rights record of any country in the world,” he added, calling on his audience to consider what country faced with threats comparable to Israel’s maintained a better record.

While he noted that Israel’s government was “far” from perfect, and that he has “much criticism of Israel, just like I have much criticism of the United States,” Dershowitz stressed the importance of making a “strong” liberal case for Israel to counter misinformation spread by the “hard left.”

“Some people confuse the hard left with liberals. Liberals support Israel,” Dershowitz said. “They may be critical of Israel, but they support Israel. Every liberal senator in the US Senate today, they are all strong supporters of Israel.

“People say to me all the time, ‘Oh, you’re a Zionist and pro-Israel, you should leave the Democratic Party and become a Republican.’ No way! I’ll never give up the Democratic Party and turn it over  to the Keith Ellisons,” he added, referring to the controversial Minnesota congressman who recently ran an unsuccessful campaign to chair the Democratic National Committee.

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2) Anti-Semitism’s Long History in America’s Organs of Foreign Policy

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When it came to light last week that the former CIA officer Valerie Plame is in the habit of promoting anti-Semitic screeds via social media, Dennis Ross—who has worked for five of the last six presidential administrations—was reminded of his own experiences at the Pentagon and State Department:

When I began working in the Pentagon during President Jimmy Carter’s administration, there was an unspoken but unmistakable assumption: if you were Jewish, you could not work on the Middle East because you would be biased. However, if you knew about the Middle East because you came from a missionary family or from the oil industry, you were an expert. Never mind that having such a background might shape a particular view of the region, the United States’ interests in it, or Israel. People with these backgrounds were perceived to be unbiased, while Jews could not be objective and would be partial to Israel to the exclusion of American interests.

Sometimes, I would find this view expressed subtly. Other times it would be overt, including well after Secretary of State George Shultz tried to change the culture of the State Department during the early years of the Reagan administration. For Shultz, being Jewish was no longer a disqualification from working on Arab-Israeli issues. . . .

[Despite these improvement], I remember well the time in 1990, when I was the head of the State Department’s policy-planning staff, that I was visited by a diplomatic-security investigator who was doing a background check on someone who had listed me as a reference. . . .

At one point, the investigator asked me . . . if this person had to choose between America’s interests and Israel’s, whose interests would he put first? There was nothing subtle about this presumption of dual loyalty.

“Why would you ask that question?” I asked, even though I realized I might not be helping the person using me as a reference. He answered, “Because he is Jewish.” . . . This investigator was not a rookie. And his experience with senior State Department officials led him to believe it was natural to ask this question. Like most mythologies which take on a life of their own, the idea that Jewish-Americans might have dual loyalties was not challenged or questioned, it was assumed.

2a) US State Department distances itself from its own Israel ambassador again

By MICHAEL WILNER

This was the second time that the State Department spokesman had come to her podium to walk back comments from the Israel envoy this month.WASHINGTON -- The State Department declined to defend David Friedman, its ambassador to Israel, on Thursday after he claimed in an interview that Israeli settlements built after 1967 are a part of the country.

The claim – which runs contrary to decades-old US policy, continued by the Trump administration – "should not be read as a way to prejudge the outcome of any negotiations" and "should not be read as a shift in US policy," State Department spokesman Heather Nauert told reporters.

"I just want to be clear that our policy has not changed​," Nauert said. ​"I want to be crystal clear​."​

And yet, it was the second time the State Department spokesman had come to her podium to walk back comments from the Israel envoy this month, after Friedman referred to the "alleged occupation" in a Jerusalem Post interview on September 1, confusing many as to whether US policy had shifted.

"We have some very effective leaders and representatives," Nauert replied, before referring to Jason Greenblatt, US special representative for international negotiations, and Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump's son-in-law tasked with leading the peace effort. She did not name Friedman.

From Washington, senior administration officials say that settlement activity is not helpful to the pursuit of peace between Israelis and Palestinians – a top priority for Trump.

Nauert said she had heard about the interview, but had not seen its full context, or spoken with the ambassador.

Friedman told Walla news that he thinks "the settlements are part of Israel," according a preview released on Thursday morning.

"I think that was always the expectation when resolution 242 was adopted in 1967," Friedman said. "The idea was that Israel would be entitled to secure borders. The existing borders, the 1967 borders, were viewed by everybody as not secure, so Israel would retain a meaningful portion of the West Bank, and it would return that which it didn't need for peace and security."

"So there was always supposed to be some notion of expansion into the West Bank, but not necessarily expansion into the entire West Bank," he continued. "And I think that's exactly what, you know, Israel has done. I mean, they're only occupying 2% of the West Bank. There is important nationalistic, historical [and] religious significance to those settlements, and I think the settlers view themselves as Israelis and Israel views the settlers as Israelis."
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3)Subject: NFL BOYCOTT SUNDAY NOV 12 

"People are now calling for a complete National Boycott of the NFL for  

Sunday 

November 12th, which is Veterans Day Weekend. They are calling for 

a Boycott of all football telecast, all fans, all ticket holders, stay 

away from attending any games, let them play to empty stadiums. 

Honor our military, some of whom come home with the American Flag 

draped over their coffin. There are plenty of ways, times and places to 

protest concerning one's chosen cause, but to do so during a brief 

special time set aside to honor our nation's flag and the bravery and lives 

of our nation's military heroes, is inappropriate and disrespectful.

Of course, black lives matter, but so do the precious lives of 

millions of US soldiers (of all races) who have made the 

ultimate sacrifice to defend and protect our nation's rights and 

freedoms....and who most certainly deserve all of our respect. 

It's not about Trump, its about all those who bravely and unselfishly 

serve and who have served our nation.

The Star-Spangled Banner and Flag is presented to honor all Americans and our 

Great Nation!Still need to see some football? Strongly support your High 

School &  College teams. 

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