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February 2014

Posted by William A. Jacobson on February 28, 2014 20 Comments
So last night I saw a term I had not heard before, "The Jew Flu." I'm not sure how I found the column from Haaretz on that topic. Someone may have tweeted the link, but regardless, it talks about what I've noticed regarding the obsession of the Jewish left with demonizing Israel beyond all rational thought. How is it that so many progressive Jews are happy to break bread with Islamists and other assorted Jew haters, but can only find harsh things to say about Israel? The Haaretz column was by Uzi Silber from 2009, but it rings true today when I see the Jews put out ahead of the BDS movement as cover. Here's an excerpt, The Jew Flu: The strange illness of Jewish anti-Semitism:
Diagnosis The 1930s Labor Zionist leader Berl Katznelson asked "Is there another People on Earth so emotionally twisted that they consider everything their nation does despicable and hateful, while every murder, rape, robbery committed by their enemies fill their hearts with admiration and awe?" This is Jew Flu - the virus of Jewish Anti-Semitism, and its Jewish Anti- and Post-Zionist mutations, afflicting a small but inordinately loud minority of Hebrews. Its modern symptoms are a rejection of Israel's identity as a Jewish state and a dismissal of its right to defend itself militarily, while embracing the goals of its nihilistic Arab enemies. Those infected with the virus wildly inflate Israeli sins real or imagined, while excusing or rationalizing Palestinian anti-semitism and outrages against Jews. Those afflicted with Jew Flu often view the notion of Peoplehood as an artifice, which implies a rejection of Jewish national self-determination and acceptance of the 90-year-old Palestinian Arab contention that Jews are not a nation but merely members of a religion, and as such don?t merit a national home of their own.
Silber then goes on to describe some historical,  sociological and psychological research on the subject, which I have no way of evaluating on medical grounds, but was interesting to read. Regardless of cause, here's his conclusion:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on February 28, 2014 17 Comments
At this point, I'm used to support for the Tea Party being mischaracterized in news coverage of polling.  The negative always is the focus, and actual analysis of the persistency of support hovering between 1-in-4 and 1-in-5 Americans is ignored: With the release of the latest New York Times/CBS News poll, the strength of the Tea Party has been ignored in favor of focus on rifts in the Republican Party and the generic congressional ballot looking better for Republicans.  Those other topics are important and worthy of coverage, but why isn't the surge in Tea Party favorability since the partial government "shutdown" getting coverage? Wait, what?!  Favorability of the Tea Party has surged since the partial shut down of some of the government?  Isn't the narrative supposed to be that the Tea Party is toast? Here are the internals for the NYT/CBS poll.  Favorability has risen from 14% in late October to 21% currently! Surge! Unfavorability has dropped by 5% too. Overall favorability actually has returned to its historical norm, but that in itself is a story. An overwhelming majority do not have an unfavorable view of the Tea Party, with almost half undecided or not having heard enough.  Most of the unfavorability comes from Democrats: CBS-NYT Poll February 2014 Q 70 Tea Party Favorability You could slice and dice this into great headlines reflecting well on the Tea Party in America.  But you won't see those headlines. Why the surge in favorablity and decline in unfavorability? Perhaps it's because the massive media attack on the Tea Party after the "shutdown" was overblown, and the Tea Party was proven correct on so many things, particularly Obamacare. As to whether the Tea Party has too much influence, the numbers also are postive although not dramatic:

Posted by David Gerstman on February 28, 2014 24 Comments
According to an article last month in the New York Times Iran is facing a major water crisis.

Iran is facing a water shortage potentially so serious that officials are making contingency plans for rationing in the greater Tehran area, home to 22 million, and other major cities around the country. President Hassan Rouhani has identified water as a national security issue, and in public speeches in areas struck hardest by the shortage he is promising to “bring the water back.”

Experts cite climate change, wasteful irrigation practices and the depletion of groundwater supplies as leading factors in the growing water shortage. In the case of Lake Urmia, they add the completion of a series of dams that choked off a major supply of fresh water flowing from the mountains that tower on either side of the lake.

According to a recent op-ed in the New York Times, Iran didn't always have a water problem.

That cooperation began in 1962, after a severe earthquake in the Qazvin region of Iran killed more than 12,000 people. The earthquake collapsed a chain of wells that engineers had drilled in a qanat, or tunnel, style. Hundreds of thousands were at risk from lack of drinking water. Israel flew in teams of drillers. New water supplies were identified, and a series of artesian wells were drilled. The drilling was such a success that Israel’s water engineering company, today a private enterprise, was hired to identify and gain access to underground resources elsewhere in Iran.

Beginning in 1968, a desalination company owned by the Israeli government built dozens of plants in Iran. These are now aging, while Israel continues to innovate: On its Mediterranean coast, it recently opened an immense, energy-efficient desalination plant. More than half of Israel’s drinking water — purer, cleaner and less salty than natural sources — now comes from seawater.

Posted by New Neo on February 28, 2014 15 Comments

Attorney General Eric Holder advises state AGs that they may disregard their oaths of office: Holder said state attorneys general do not have to enforce laws they disagree with, specifically when it comes to the issue of gay marriage. "It is highly unusual for the United States...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on February 27, 2014 19 Comments

February 19, 2009, is the date credited as the start of the Tea Party movement, although some activists would differ and say they already were laying the groundwork. But there's no doubt that Rick Santelli's call for a Chicago Tea Party on CNBC was the moment that...

Posted by Mandy Nagy on February 27, 2014 20 Comments

Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University, testified Wednesday before the House Judiciary Committee on the topic of “Enforcing the President’s Constitutional Duty to Faithfully Execute the Laws.” Turley expressed concern that “We are in the midst of a constitutional crisis with sweeping implications...

Posted by A.F. Branco on February 27, 2014 6 Comments

Note: You may reprint this cartoon provided you link back to this source.  To see more Legal Insurrection Branco cartoons, click here. Branco’s page is Cartoonist A.F.Branco...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on February 27, 2014 10 Comments
We previously made reference to the anti-Israel conference organized for February 28- March 1, 2014 by Lisa Duggan, a professor in NYU's American Studies Department and incoming President of the American Studies Association. (Full conference poster at bottom of post.) When Elder of Ziyon blog and others caught wind of Duggan trying to keep the Conference from coming to the attention of those who oppose ASA's academic boycott of Israel, the Facebook post for the event was taken down. The Conference is an NYU function, but it's hardly academic. The panels are stacked with anti-Israel academic boycott movement supporters arguing in favor of the boycott, including Wesleyan University Professor J. Kehaulani Kauanui. The lunchtime panel is explicitly an anti-Israeli organizing event:

NYU American Studies Conference February 28 2014 part poster

There isn't even a pretense of academic discussion on that panel. Such is American Studies at NYU. NYU's response?
“This weekend’s American Studies Program Annual Conference is an annual academic conference that is organized by graduate students in NYU’s American Studies Program and designed for faculty and students in this and related disciplines,” said Philip Lentz, the university’s director of public affairs. “Given the purpose of the conference and space considerations, it is not open to the general public or the press.”
Elder of Ziyon points out:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on February 27, 2014 14 Comments

Remember Obama and Deval Patrick's "just words" similarity? That's nothing compared to this hysterical video mash up from The Blaze: ...

Posted by Mandy Nagy on February 27, 2014 10 Comments
There have been some developments in Ukraine since late yesterday. In Crimea, armed gunmen seized the regional government headquarters and parliament buildings and raised the Russian flag, according to Reuters.
Armed men seized the regional government headquarters and parliament in Ukraine's Crimea on Thursday and raised the Russian flag, alarming Kiev's new rulers, who urged Moscow not to abuse its navy base rights on the peninsula by moving troops around. "I am appealing to the military leadership of the Russian Black Sea fleet," said Olexander Turchinov, acting president since the removal of Viktor Yanukovich last week. "Any military movements, the more so if they are with weapons, beyond the boundaries of this territory (the base) will be seen by us as military aggression
    Ousted President Viktor Yanukovich is said to have been "granted" protection inside Russia.

Posted by Andrew Branca on February 27, 2014 228 Comments
First, full disclosure: I was contacted personally by one of the lawyers for Joseph Walker, the New Jersey law enforcement officer charged with first degree murder by Maryland in the "road rage" shooting death of Joseph Dean Harvey, Jr. Walker's defense attorney Charles Curlett told me that he'd seen the coverage of the Walker trial here at Legal Insurrection, and offered to send me the motion to dismiss the indictment for first degree murder and the motion to allow into evidence Walker's polygraph results, both of which had been submitted to the trial court yesterday. (For the record, I very much doubt that this is a matter of my being somehow special -- now that the documents have been filed they are public record -- but rather more likely reflects the fact that the "journalists" covering this story wouldn't have much interest in either legal document). (We covered the essential elements of this motion to dismiss, based just on news reports, in our last post on this trial:  Off-duty “Road Rage” Cop lawyer: Grand Jury given “materially false and misleading testimony”.) Naturally I replied that I'd love to see them, and I had received them via email forthwith this afternoon. The motion to dismiss the indictment, together with the attached exhibits, totals nearly 300 pages, and I'm afraid even I can't move my way through 300 pages of legalese and witness interviews in a couple of hours. So far, I've made it through the motion itself, and the transcript of the first witness exhibit, that of Adam Pidel, the passenger riding with Joseph Dean Harvey, Jr. the night of the shooting.  Both of those documents are embedded below.

Posted by Mandy Nagy on February 26, 2014 13 Comments
Amid ongoing tension in Ukraine, Russia's president ordered a military drill Wednesday, scheduled to continue until March 3rd. From the NY Times:
President Vladimir V. Putin ordered a surprise exercise of ground and air forces on Ukraine’s doorstep Wednesday, intending to demonstrate his country’s military preparedness at a time of heightened tensions with Europe and the United States over the turmoil gripping Russia’s western neighbor. The Obama administration said any Russian military intervention in Ukraine would be a costly and “grave mistake.”

Russia’s military put tens of thousands of troops in western Russia on alert at 2 p.m. for an exercise scheduled to last until March 3. The minister of defense, Sergei K. Shoigu, also announced unspecified measures to tighten security at the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet on Ukraine’s Crimea peninsula.

The NY Times noted however that “senior defense and government officials later said the exercise was not related to the events in Ukraine.”  A Reuters article, Putin puts troops in western Russia on alert in drill, also reports that officials in Russia said the drills were previously planned. Buzzfeed also reports that Russia gave U.S. military leaders advance warning about the military exercise. Regardless of any advance notice, observers and U.S. officials of course remain concerned. Speaking on MSNBC’s “Andrea Mitchell Reports” on Wednesday, Secretary of State John Kerry indicated that he hopes Russia will respect the sovereignty of Ukraine.
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