Thursday, April 15, 2021

Another Brain Freeze. Blinken Finally Nods. Iran Almost Bankrupted By Trump Now Being Saved By Biden? Tobin Speaks Out.


 

















Lynn attended a meeting today of conservative women and came back messaging  that a subtle groundswell shift is building.  I pray she is right. Leave it to women to get things done. They are far more zealous when they finally commit than men. One of the women who spoke said the left has moved so far left they are now in radical la la land and Democrat moderates may not yet know it but will soon find a home in the republicans Party. The speaker who said this is a former Democrat, a lawyer who came south and is now a Republican.

Dan Heninger's op ep below caused me to conclude progressive liberal policies have destroyed the middle class, is finally forcing blacks to open their eyes so radical Democrats must bring in illegals to replenish their ranks. This is why Biden is being forced to move quickly, enact legislation that will solidify their power and control

Meanwhile, what I find ironic is thousands of  "WOKE" CEO's, who enriched themselves through capitalism and were even awarded golden parachutes by their brain dead boards when they failed, have now apparently chosen to abandon capitalism, jump out of planes, sans anything on their backs, previously piloted by Republicans.

When CEOs Zoom for Democrats

Last weekend, some 100 corporation leaders did a Davos by laptop to vilify Republicans and validate their status.

The CEOs of about 100 U.S. companies gathered Saturday for a Zoom meeting, in Covid-stricken America, to discuss and denounce state voting laws, though only the ones written by Republicans. Several called in to the meeting—about the future of “democracy”—while attending the third round of the Masters golf tournament in Georgia.

The spectacle of 100 executives meeting on the weekend to discuss voter suppression is the Zoom version of Davos, the World Economic Forum’s earnest annual exercise in Switzerland for “addressing” the world’s problems, though its primary function is to bestow status and validation on the CEOs invited to attend.

As in Davos, the air in CEO Zoomland seems dizzyingly thin, triggering a giddy euphoria most company leaders don’t bring to meetings about spending their own firm’s money. How else to explain the political obliviousness of this event?

However high-minded their intent, these CEOs are bolting their company’s interests to the professionals running the Democratic Party, whose No. 1 project is enacting a federal election law that advantages Democratic voting strategies such as ballot harvesting. That’s “democracy”?

 More astonishing, these CEOs are acting as though a strong Democratic majority will extend to the horizon of national politics. In fact, Democrats control half of the U.S. Senate and have a six-seat majority in the House. In 2020, Republican congressional candidates ran ahead of Donald Trump in New York and California. Odds are that Nancy Pelosi won’t be speaker after next year’s midterm elections. When that happens, one way or another, there will be retribution for this Zoom meeting.

For many of the CEO Zoomers, the meeting was simply a political coming-out party. This group is a self-selecting subsample of America’s business leadership. A lot support the Democratic Party financially and will go wherever it asks them to go.

According to the Journal’s report on the meeting, “some executives on the call described some bills as either racist or restrictive.” But what really matters to Democrats whose lifetime compensation depends on winning is that in the 2020 election, between 12% and 18% of black men voted for the Republican presidential candidate, in large part because of economic gains—jobs and wages—from 2016 through 2019.

Democrats can’t afford additional voluntary black-voter swings toward Republicans in closely contested states such as North Carolina, Florida and Ohio. For professional Democrats, the details of the voting legislation in a state like Georgia are a second-order concern. More important is creating a dramatic public narrative aligning the party with black voters while making Republicans look anathema. The Zoom CEOs played their assigned partisan roles beautifully, though even in an era of compulsive virtue-signaling, one hates to see virtue reduced to political PR.

 None of this is to suggest that the attendees at the Zoom Davos are hopeless political naïfs. One doesn’t rise to the corporate mountaintop without an eye on the bottom line. Some of the CEOs are betting on the Democrats propping up their businesses with the multiple subsidies and tax credits embedded in Joe Biden’s spending on green energy, infrastructure, healthcare and technology.

As always, new public subsidies imply new taxes, which, as always, CEOs can afford—or afford to pay someone to minimize. But their line managers and employees will pay. Someone has to.

In a way, these smug Zoom CEOs remind me of what were called “country club Republicans” in the 1950s. But in a world with woke employees’ eyes on you 24/7, you can’t get away with riding out Covid at a country home. So some of them are ostentatiously threatening to withhold investments from disfavored Republican states.

All this has caused some conservatives to decide to tee up “corporations” as the enemy of a post-Trump populist movement they imagine can be built around “working-class Americans.” This is a mistake and misjudgment.

Conservatives or Republican politicians attacking “corporate America” are rhetorically provocative but must confuse many average people hearing it—who themselves are corporate America.

Google, Facebook and Twitter may be woke compost heaps from the executive office down through entry-level interns, but corporate America isn’t Santa Clara County.

Across the U.S., legal entities called corporations employ millions of Americans—most of them middle class, most raising families, and many living in battleground states and suburbs that Republicans must carry to win elections.

Coca-Cola has more than 86,000 employees, many living in up-for-grabs Georgia, but what are they supposed to think when conservatives attack “Coca-Cola,” though in fact their (deserved) target is one person—CEO James Quincey ?

By all means, call out these CEOs by name. But it makes no sense for Republicans to cancel millions of Americans as “the corporate class,” a phrase with virtually no real meaning outside an AOC tweet.

The problem isn’t the American corporation. The problem is a small but influential and unbearably sanctimonious swath of leaders who’ve gone ga-ga over progressive politics.

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Another mental freeze:

Yellow Stickies From The

Refrigerator Door of My Mind

Part 2:

Other Nagging Thoughts From “The Fridge”

 

by Pem SchaefferApril 15, 1 A.T.

pemster4062@yahoo.com

 

·     I recently read this somewhere; it might have been in the report released by the Trump 1776 Commission, cancelled by Biden with one of his first executive orders.

·     “It wasn’t strokes of luck but divine Providence that made this possible. President Washington later charged his fellow Americans that 'We ought to be no less persuaded that the propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained.' ”

 

·     The names of some elected leaders discourage respect, and instead cry out for parody. Consider: Andy “Slides” Cuomo; Gavvy “Monger mon Shorts” Newsom, or perhaps “Gruesome” Newsom; Lori “Two Left Feet” Lightfoot; DeBilly “DeFund” DeBlasio; Jenny “Summer Love” Durkin; Ted “Teddy Bear” Wheeler; Jake “Fish” Frey; and Lyda “Lightweight” Krewson. I mean, who wouldn't stand down when “Mayor Jenny” says “stop this peace spreading, and stop it right now, or no Ice Cream tonight!”

 

·     How many times have you heard our betters proclaim that “the wealthy and corporations” need to pay “their fair share?” Can someone direct me to the federal statutes defining “wealthy” and “corporations” as applied in these standards of bloviation? And the statute defining “their fair share” as well. If there are no such statutes, please tell me the name of the Handbook that provides the precise, definitive language clarifying these terms, so I can order it on Amazon. Don't tell me it's Alinsky's Rules for Radicals, though many might think so.

 

·     Abortion is to “reproductive rights” as gun confiscation is to Second Amendment Rights and removing vocal cords is to Free Speech Rights.

 

·     If Gender Identity is a social construct, then Racial Identity must necessarily be so as well. And what about parentage and ancestry? The family tree? Shouldn't they be socially constructed as well, rather than biologically and genetically?

 

·     If Black Lives Matter (BLM) goes off in a rage when anyone counters with All Lives Matter, then what they must really mean is OLDM (Other Lives Don't Matter). We already know they only mean Some Black Lives Matter, not All Black Lives. Sounds like systemic racism to me. Just check on the thousands of shootings and hundreds of homicides in places like Chicago, in which both shooter and victim are black, yet BLM takes no direct action.

 

·     BLM and Systemic Racism reduce to Our Race in Your Face.

 

·     Diversity and Inclusion? Screw you; We want Perversity and Exclusion! We want segregation in college ceremonies and housing! How's that for equity? THIS is Jim Crow 2.0; when will they want their own classes, water fountains, rest-rooms, and dining counters?

 

·     Follow the Science? You mean the science that says gender is a social construct, instead of assigned at birth? The science that says there are 57 gender varieties or more? Including fluid? You want us to follow that science?

 

·     From a Thomas Sowell column: This is ultimately not about the environment but about egos. As T.S. Eliot said, more than fifty years ago: "Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don't mean to do harm -- but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves."

 

·     Government run Public Schools are the closest example we have of socialism; an enterprise totally controlled by Governments and elected and unelected bureaucrats. Using it as a model for the rest of society, are these schools how you would imagine every aspect of your life being governed?

 

·     If Gender Identity is a social construct, why do so many candidates for “transition” want to mutilate their bodies to mask their sex assigned at birth? Can't they just adopt the change intellectually with their socially re-constructed gender?

 

·     Equity is a fancy word for socialism; a euphemism. You know, spread the wealth around. How many of those in the upper reaches of society preaching equity are willing to lower their lifestyles down to the average of the working classes?

 

·     If you have a hard time seeing 100,000 border crossings as a problem, imagine a caravan of more than 2,000 buses full of immigrants pulling into your town looking for a “free ride” to go with their free ride. And then remind yourself that $2 Trillion amounts to $1 Billion for each one of those buses.

 

·     Why is it that 25,000 National Guard troops build dual fence rings around the Capitol Grounds and stay for months to protect the inhabitants after a few hundred “over zealous” peaceful protesters breach the normal Capitol security boundary for a few hours. But at the Southern US Border, thousands per day breach the security boundary, at the invitation of the President, and no troops are sent at all to protect against the on-going breach, and provisions of every type are relaxed to make it easier for the illegal crossers to stay permanently and collect amnesty benefits for doing so. We have lost control of the border, and of our collective minds.

 

·     Gender is a social construct just like ears, eyes, noses, mouths, hands, and feet are social constructs.

 

·     Remember Rep. Jim Clyburn preaching with outrage about the voter suppression that was clearly happening in Georgia and elsewhere? Did you see the video of him taking that charge back once the outcomes were as he wished? Hmm; maybe YouTube deleted it.

 

·     How come so many of the “asylum seekers” illegally crossing our borders have smart phones and active accounts for their use, and $5,000 or so per person to pay cartel operatives to get them to our border? What's wrong with this picture?

 

·     If Math is systemically racist, will telling the 4's and 5's to take a knee when the US Flag is within their sight be an acceptable way to show regrets? Are just the odd numbers racist, or the even numbers, or the irrational numbers? Oh wait....odd and even are just social constructs. An even number can dress like an odd number and express as odd.

 

·     If Math is racist, then so are the following:

·     Calculators, adding machines, computers, and math teachers.

·     Trust/follow the science;” science relies on math as a foundation.

·     Physics and all the engineering subjects and disciplines, which are built on a math foundation.

·     Architects, builders, plumbers, electricians, carpenters, construction engineers...

·     Finance managers, accountants, and investment councilors.

·     The IRS and every government revenue, accounting, and budgeting office.

·     The stock markets and banks.

·     Your mortgage and personal lenders.

·     Your utility companies.

·     Competitive sports.

·     In sum, anything that relies on math as a core element must be racist.

 

·     If United Airlines is going to rebuild its Pilot population to look more like America, shouldn't we expect the NFL and the NBA to commit to rebuilding their player ranks to look more like America? If choosing the most qualified, regardless of gender and race, is no longer the best way to run things, than shouldn't we go all in?

 

·     (Props to Greg Gutfeld). If the Government gives you food assistance, they don't give the money to their favorite market; they give it to you so you can pick the market you prefer. Colleges and Universities seem to survive in a competitive market without Government mandated attendance. So remind us again why students have to attend public K-12 unless there is a law that says they can choose their own schools and use government $ to pay for it?

 

·     If the Government provides food benefits via EBT cards, why can't they provide the benefits of an education with the same methods?

 

·     If gender is a social construct, than a watermelon can become a baseball bat and vice versa.

 

·     If Shakespeare is racist, would revising it to “To Be Black, or Not To Be Black; that is the question” help correct things? If Shakespeare is racist, then:

·     Every form of the arts and literature is racist.

·     Poets are racist.

·     Songwriters and singers are racist.

·     Authors of every stripe are racist.

·     Newspapers and magazines are racist.

·     Media, in all its forms, is racist.

 

·     When rampaging Black “peaceful protesters” loot, burn, and otherwise destroy businesses owned by OTBs, is that a Hate Crime? If not, why not?

 

·     If a Black kills an OTB, is that a hate crime? If not, why not?

 

·     Sanctuary cities in a supposed nation of laws? Ignoring bail and sentence enhancement laws? We are not a nation OF laws; we are a nation WITH laws, and there is an enormous difference.

 

·     Laws don't stop crime. Enforcing laws can lower the crime rate by deterring repeat violations and convincing others it is a bad idea. This requires thoughtful contemplation, and many will never get the intended lessons, just like some high school graduates can't read.

 

·     It's not “Racism;” It's “Prejudice.” My parents always cautioned me against prejudice, not racism. Kendi, BLM, Robin DiAngelo, and all the other race gurus of our day are all prejudiced: they prejudge.

 

·     Whither goest The National DNA?

·     Where are the Bennetts, the Sinatras, and the Crosbys of the new age?

·     Where have all the great American songbook writers gone?

·     Where have the great Broadway show writers/composers gone?

·     Where have the Looney Tunes, the Disneys, the Poohs, the Dr. Seuss's gone? Can you believe Disneyland opened in 1955?

·     Where have the simple joys of laughter and song and dance gone?

·     Why are there no more Astaires, Grants, Kellys, Donald O'Connors, Dan Daileys, Danny Kayes, Bob Hopes, and Jack Bennys? And those gorgeous, talented ladies with whom they co-starred?

·     Why are there no more pure entertainers: those who could act, sing, dance, and be at ease and likable as guests on Johnny Carson?

·     Why are the patriotic parades with Fire Engines, Marching Bands, Troops, Scouts, and kids riding bikes with decorated wheels no more?

·     Where is River City when you need it?

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Blinken finally nods over Iranian uranium threat:



http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/304399

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Virtually every day Biden hides yet somehow continues to display his stupidity:


Trump’s Action Against Iran Almost Bankrupted It, Report Finds

(RightWing.org) – President Biden is making headlines with his push to restart the diplomatic process with Iran. He’s committed the US to rejoin the nuclear deal negotiated when he was Obama’s VP and done everything else he can to distance himself from President Trump’s Iran policy. So he won’t be pleased with a new report that says his predecessor’s policy was working.

On April 14, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) released its latest research on the Iranian economy, and it shows that Trump’s sanctions were hammering the Tehran regime. Between 2018 and 2020, the rogue state was forced to spend $118.5 billion of its reserves and was down to its last $4 billion when Biden took over. That’s exactly what Trump was trying to do – force the ayatollahs to burn cash so they’d have to stop spending money on nuclear research.

Now Biden is lifting the sanctions just as they start to bite. Iran has already shown what it thinks of the nuclear deal, announcing it will enrich uranium to 60% – 10 times higher than what it needs for peaceful purposes and not far short of weapons-grade. And Joe Biden will give them the money to pay for it

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Apparently Biden's goal is to make sure government is one big diverse mosaic. However, our  "good old boy" State Department continues to embrace the worst attitudes when it comes to Israel. According to Tobin, Biden's selections reflect a new virulent anti-Semitic posture

Will the State Department’s new anti-Semitism monitor give a pass to anti-Semites?

Jewish Democrats are competing for the post. But if the progressives get their way, the pick may not uphold a definition of Jew-hatred that applies to the left as well as the right.

JONATHAN S. TOBIN

(April 13, 2021 / JNS) In recent weeks, an attempt to derail a consensus about the definition of anti-Semitism has received serious support from the Jewish left. The mainstream Jewish community, in addition to the United States and a number of other nations, has embraced the definition put forward by the International Holocaust Remembrance Association. But two new definitions have emerged to challenge that text. This controversy may also play a role in both the selection of a new head of the State Department’s Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism and the future role of that office.

In one case, a group of scholars and activists backed an alternate definition cooked up by the Nexus Task Force, a group affiliated with the University of Southern California. Days later, a similar document, dubbed the Jerusalem Declaration by its authors, was published. In both, critics and foes of Israel joined together to craft a definition of Jew-hatred that took care to exempt those who oppose Israel’s existence or compare it to the Nazis.

The goal of both groups was to shift the debate about anti-Semitism from one that recognizes that hatred and delegitimization of Jews comes from both the left and the right to a sole focus on extreme right-wingers.

The key to understanding this controversy is politics.

In the wake of the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol riot, many on the left as well as leading Democrats and members of the media, have concentrated on sounding the alarm about the far-right. Anti-Semitic imagery among some of those in that mob reinforced the concerns that have understandably been heightened since the synagogue shootings in Pittsburgh and Poway.

At the same time, there is the recognition of an uptick in anti-Semitism—largely operating under the cloak of anti-Zionism—in American life and in some new circles. That’s partly the result of the notoriety and favorable publicity given by the media to Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), who are both supporters of the anti-Semitic BDS movement. The pair has also trafficked in anti-Semitic tropes.

Nor are they alone. Leading supporters of the Black Lives Matter movement, like Tamika Mallory are vocal supporters of Nation of Islam hatemonger Louis Farrakhan and have engaged in discrimination and incitement against Jews. The 2019 epidemic of attacks on Orthodox Jews in the New York area by African-Americans can also be seen as, at least in part, evidence of the influence of both Farrakhan and some of the extremists associated with the BLM movement.

That means for any official tasked with the job of monitoring and advocating against anti-Semitism to be effective, they must shake off their partisan blinders and be ready to speak out against hate from both ends of the political spectrum.

But if one increasingly influential faction gets their way, that won’t be the case in the next four years.

The State Department’s office dealing with anti-Semitism only dates back only to legislation passed in 2004, and the first person to get the job wasn’t sworn in until 2006. Like the other 4,000 political appointments that any new president can make, there are many people who want the job. But unlike the usual quiet lobbying that goes on behind the scenes for most such jobs, the competition for this post has gone public.

Several Jewish Democrats are openly vying for the position, and the battle over it has unsurprisingly become a proxy war between party factions.

A lot of mainstream traditionally pro-Israel Democrats want President Joe Biden to name former Anti-Defamation League head Abe Foxman to the job. Given Foxman’s long record of fighting anti-Semitism and strong support for Zionism, he’s the most qualified choice. And given the fact that he dropped his nonpartisan stance in favor of open advocacy against former President Donald Trump, as well as endorsed the Democrats’ disgraceful analogies between the most pro-Israel president to date with the Nazis during the 2020 election campaign, perhaps he’s earned Biden’s gratitude.

Another possible contender is historian Deborah Lipstadt, who is well-known for her groundbreaking work on Holocaust denial, and who also supported Biden and backed the bogus Nazi analogies about Trump.

Now it appears that there is also serious support for Nancy Kaufman, a veteran liberal Jewish community professional and the former CEO of the National Council of Jewish Women. As an article in The Forward made clear, Kaufman is the clear choice of “progressives.” And given the increasing sway the left has in the Biden administration, she may be the most likely choice.

The scramble for the position can be seen as merely a matter of patronage with the plum going to the candidate who can amass the most political IOUs from the people in power. In this case, however, there’s more at stake here than the pedestrian question of which Jewish Democrat will get what is, in the context of the many other more powerful jobs up for grabs, a relatively minor post.

That’s because while Kaufman is a very familiar face in the alphabet soup world of Jewish organizational life, she cannot be counted on to oppose left-wing anti-Semites.

As The Forward pointed out, though Kaufman claims to be a mainstream supporter of Israel, she only thinks of the IHRA definition as “an interesting tool” and opposes codifying it into law. That means that she opposes the passage of laws that outlaw discriminatory business practices rooted in BDS boycotts of Israelis and Israeli products. She also praised the so-called Jerusalem Declaration on anti-Semitism, whose purpose is to essentially give a permission slip to anti-Semites who masquerade as advocates for “human rights” but who seek to deny to Jews what no one would think of denying to anyone else: the right to live in peace and sovereignty in their homeland and the right to defend themselves.

Even more damning, in the course of pursuing anti-Trump and liberal political activity, she has made common cause with and even praised open anti-Semites like Mallory and Linda Sarsour when they worked at the Women’s March, from which they were ultimately booted for their support for Farrakhan and discrimination against Jewish women.

Among Kaufman’s supporters is the viciously anti-Zionist IfNotNow group, which seeks to sabotage Birthright Israel trips, although that organization is probably more interested in stopping Foxman than boosting Kaufman.

Just as telling is the support Kaufman has received from American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten. Just last week, Weingarten invoked anti-Semitic tropes and toxic critical race theory arguments to defend her union’s outrageous stand against reopening public schools.

Yet the person who wants to be the leading voice against anti-Semitism abroad had nothing to say about Weingarten’s outrageous and disgraceful statement. The same can be said about everyone else on the Jewish left, especially the Anti-Defamation League and its leader, Jonathan Greenblatt, who also refused to condemn a fellow liberal like Weingarten.

Seen in this light, it’s clear that not only is Kaufman unfit for the job, she is also likely to use her post not to advocate, as her GOP predecessor Elan Carr did, against anti-Semites abroad, but could instead use her office’s resources to play domestic politics by lending legitimacy to leftist Jew-haters like Omar, Tlaib, Mallory and Sarsour.

If Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken are serious about supporting the IHRA definition and fighting anti-Semitism, then they will risk offending progressives and turn Kaufman down. If not, the administration’s effort to fight Jew-hatred may be over even before it starts.

Jonathan S. Tobin is editor in chief of JNS—Jewish News Syndicate. Follow him on Twitter at: @jonathans_tobin.

He is also  a senior contributor for The Federalist, a columnist for the New York Post, Newsweek and Haaretz. He can be reached via e-mail at: jtobin@jns.org

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HOOVER Daily Report (edited.)


 
 
Why Trump Went Hard On China, And Biden Will Follow
by H. R. McMaster via Politico

As I reported for my first day of duty in the West Wing of the White House on Feb. 21, 2017, I believed that America’s strategic competence had diminished due to strategic narcissism: the tendency to define problems as one might like them to be and indulge in the conceit that others have no authorship over the future and no aspirations beyond their response to U.S. decisions and actions.

 
 
Cold War II-Just How Dangerous Is China?
interview with H. R. McMasterMatt Pottinger via Uncommon Knowledge

What are China’s ambitions toward Taiwan? And if they are ominous, what should the US response to Chinese aggression be? To answer these questions, we’re joined by two experts: former national security advisor (and current Hoover Institution senior fellow) H. R. McMaster and former US deputy national security advisor (and current Hoover distinguished visiting fellow) Matthew Pottinger. They also discuss the Biden administration’s recent diplomatic encounters with China, and which countries might be allies in a conflict with China—and which ones would not be. 

 
 
An Assessment Of The CCP's Economic Ambitions, Plans, And Metrics Of Success
with Matt PottingerMiles Maochun Yu via Hoover Daily Report

Hoover Institution fellows Matt Pottinger and Miles Yu both give testimonies before the US-China Economics & Security Review Commission on "An Assessment of the CCP’s Economic Ambitions, Plans, and Metrics of Success."

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