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December 2013

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 04, 2013 15 Comments
Just one day after Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah gave a gloating television interview about the triumph of the Iranian nuclear deal, the former head of Hezbollah's rocket forces, someone involved in procuring arms from Iran, and a close associate of Nasrallah was assassinated outside his home in Beirut. Via Times of Israel:
Lebanese Shiite terrorist organization Hezbollah on Wednesday accused Israel of assassinating a top operative outside his home overnight. A statement released by Hezbollah said Hassan al-Laqis was killed near his house in Beirut as he was coming home from work. Laqis was at one point one of the main commanders of Hezbollah’s rocket division, which fired hundreds of missiles at Israel. According to reports in the Lebanese media, Israel tried to assassinate him during the 2006 Second Lebanon War and failed. A statement released by Hezbollah said Hassan al-Laqis was killed near his house in Beirut as he was coming home from work. Laqis was at one point one of the main commanders of Hezbollah’s rocket division, which fired hundreds of missiles at Israel. According to reports in the Lebanese media, Israel tried to assassinate him during the 2006 Second Lebanon War and failed.
Via WaPo:
Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor denied that Israel was involved, the Associated Press reported. “Israel has nothing to do with this incident,” Palmor said. “These automatic accusations are an innate reflex with Hezbollah. They don't need evidence, they don't need facts, they just blame anything on Israel.” The commander was shot five times in the head and neck, the Lebanese Daily Star newspaper reported, citing an unidentified security official. Hezbollah said Laqees had spent his life serving the “resistance” against Israel and lost a son during the group’s 2006 war with Israel. He was previously the target of several failed assassination attempts, it said.
The Daily Star of Lebanon reports an unknown Sunni jihadist group claimed responsibility:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 03, 2013 32 Comments
Really, now we're going to make estimated payments to insurance companies because healthcare.gov doesn't even have a payment system? Megyn Kelly discussed this tonight. (Video added at bottom of post.) Here's the Reuters report, Short-term fix eyed for another problem with U.S. healthcare website:
Dec 3 (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's administration has found a short-term fix to pay insurance companies for plans selected on HealthCare.gov, the not-yet-complete government website used to shop for insurance required under Obama's healthcare program. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has not yet finished building the part of the website that would transfer billions of dollars in subsidies for plan premiums and cost-sharing payments to insurance companies. It is part of a long technical to-do list that has so far focused on fixing the errors and lag times in the part of the website used by consumers.... The administration is planning a "workaround" for payments, said Daniel Durham, vice president for policy and regulatory affairs at America's Health Insurance Plans. Health plans will estimate how much they are owed, and submit that estimate to the government. Once the system is built, the government and insurers can reconcile the payments made with the plan data to "true up" payments, he said.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 03, 2013 47 Comments

A follow up to An increasingly dangerous presidency and More on Obama lawlessness. You can read the full testimonies at the links. The key thing is that there may be no remedy -- other than at the ballot box in 2014 -- to Obama's lawlessness. There...

Posted by Mandy Nagy on December 03, 2013 3 Comments

The Guardian has only published about one percent of the material leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, according to statements made by the outlet's editor to a British parliamentary committee Tuesday. From the Associated Press via the Washington Post: The editor of the Guardian said Tuesday...

Posted by 0387erp on December 03, 2013 26 Comments
[WAJ Intro: There are huge developments targeting conservatives and Scott Walker supporters in Wisconsin. I asked Matt Kittle of Wisconsin Reporter, who has written extensively about the so-called "John Doe" investigations, to explain the situation to Legal Insurrection readers because of the national implications, and he kindly agreed to do this guest post.] There’s a secret war being waged in Wisconsin, and the outcome could have national ramifications on free speech and the rule of law. As first reported by Wisconsin Reporter in late October, a Democrat-led, secret probe now nearly two years in the making has targeted dozens of conservative organizations on the ground in the Badger State. The so-called John Doe investigation, which one former Federal Elections Commission member said makes the “Alien and Sedition Act mild by comparison,” has raised serious questions of partisanship and prosecutorial abuse. A Nov. 18 Wall Street Journal opinion piece, headlined “Wisconsin Political Speech Raid,” reported at least three homes had been raided, and more than 100 subpoenas had been handed out – including one that demands “all records of income received, including fundraising information and the identity of persons contributing to the corporation.” What’s it all about?

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 03, 2013 2 Comments
In an interview airing now on Lebanese OTV television, Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah discusses the Iranian nuclear deal (summary translation via NOW Lebanon):
The Iran nuclear deal has significant repercussions. The region’s peoples are the biggest winners from this deal because regional and international forces have been pushing for war with Iran which would have had dangerous repercussions in the region. The deal pushed off the [potential Israeli and US] war [against Iran]. Israel cannot possibly bomb nuclear facilities without the US’ green light. Monopoly of power is no longer present. All American wars have failed. John Kerry made it clear that the US does not want more wars. The US and Europe have failed in the region. It is unlikely that normalization will take place. Iranians wanted to reassure the Gulf countries, especially Saudi Arabia. [interview in progress, check link for more]
More translation at Naharnet:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 03, 2013 6 Comments
A highly criticized Swiss analysis suggested a moderate possibility of polonium poisoining as the cause of Yasser Arafat's death.  Arafat's widow had requested the testing. Palestinian political officials immediately announced (as they had even before the Swiss report) that Israel was the culprit. AFP now is reporting that a French group of experts dismisses the claim of poisoning (h/t NOW English): https://twitter.com/AFP/status/407878555729928192 Arafat's death: French experts dismiss the poisoning theory  (via Google Translate):
So says a source close to the ... The experts appointed by the French justice to investigate the death of Yasser Arafat, who died in 2004 near Paris, depart the thesis of poisoning the Palestinian leader, told AFP on Tuesday a source familiar with the matter. "This report rejected the theory of poisoning and goes in the direction of a natural death," the source said, confirming information from France Inter. Recent reports of Swiss and Russian medical tests on samples of the remains of the historic Palestinian leader had revealed the presence of abnormal amounts of polonium-210 in the body and seemed to support the theory of poisoning.
Update: Al Jazeera is reporting similar findings:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 03, 2013 6 Comments

From Nanette: Spotted in Kingwood, TX Absolutely love the bottom one and thought you would too! Thanks for all you do! ...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 02, 2013 40 Comments

We have been covering the case of the Romeikes, devout Christians from Germany who wanted to homeschool their children because of what they perceived as the secularist agenda in German public schools. They fled and sought asylum in the U.S. after they faced mounting fines...

Posted by Mandy Nagy on December 02, 2013 6 Comments

Protesters in Ukraine ramped up activities Monday as they blocked entrances to government offices, blocked streets, and have called for a nationwide strike.  The actions follow a weekend of protests, triggered by the Ukranian president’s refusal to sign an association agreement with the European Union. From...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 02, 2013 8 Comments
The machete murder of British soldier Lee Rigby on the open street by Islamic terrorists garnered widespread media attention in the U.S. at the time. Leslie wrote about the case last May, My Memorial Day Tribute to Self Defense, and we featured British newspaper front pages: Daily Mirror Cover - Machete Terror Attack The ongoing trial of the murderers, however, has not received much attention in the U.S. media.  Here are some updates from British media.

Posted by A.F. Branco on December 02, 2013 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 December 02, 2013 28 Comments
Yesterday the Obama administration declared Mission Accomplished on the healthcare.gov website. But the mission that was accomplished was something of a Potemkin Village -- the "front end" has been improved to a lower level of failure. Taking the glass half-full approach, 80-90% of users will be able to use the website. But that's just the appearance side of the story. The "back end" still doesn't work right and much of the system hasn't even been built yet. Add to that the sticker shock not only from premiums, but from outsized deductibles, and the declaration of Mission Accomplished is worthy of the Tsars and Tsarninas. Here are some other historical references which may apply:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 02, 2013 4 Comments
We have written many times before about how we only hear about the non-Jewish Arab refugees created when the Arab armies invaded Israel in 1948, but hear almost nothing about Jewish refugees from Arab countries: The claim that the Nakbah -- the catastrophe -- created only one refugee problem is a fundamental part of anti-Israeli agitation and an impedement to peace as Palestinians insist on a right of return for non-Jewish refugees and their descendents. In fact, there were an equal number of Jewish refugees who fled Arab countries for Israel. (The Forgotten Refugees - Full Documentary Movie is available on YouTube) Approximately half of Israel's current Jewish population are such Jewish refugees from Arab countries or their descendents. This exchange of populations goes unrecognized because Israel absorbed and welcomed its refugess, while Arab countries -- long before there was a "Palestinian" national identity -- kept the non-Jewish Arab refugees in separate camps and refused them and their descendents citizenship or other civil rights in many cases. There is an effort to change this misperception and to recognize the Jewish Nakbah, the ethnic cleansing of Jews in Arab countries, as part of any international discussion of Palestinian refugees. The effort at the U.N. is being led by Israeli Ambassador Ron Prosor, as reported by The Times of Israel, UN Jewish refugees panel aims ‘to rectify history’:

Posted by David Gerstman on December 02, 2013 6 Comments
In an article about Wendy Sherman, the administration's chief nuclear negotiator, Politics and a Ruptured Tendon Don’t Faze Lead Iran Negotiator, the NY Times reports sympathetically, even while indicting her.
Along the way, Ms. Sherman was the State Department’s chief strategist in dealing with the North Korean nuclear program. It was a searing experience, in both its temporary successes and long-term failure, that prepared her for the complexity of the Iranian negotiations, and has made her a target for those on Capitol Hill who argue that history is about to repeat itself.
What were the temporary successes? It was coming to agreements with the rogue regime. The long term failure stemmed from trusting those successes to deter North Korea. So if and when Iran develops a nuclear weapon, will we read about the temporary success of Geneva? For a history of Wendy Sherman that doesn't pull punches see Axis of Fantasy vs. Axis of Reality by Bret Stephens:

Posted by Mandy Nagy on December 01, 2013 12 Comments
The personal information of approximately 90,000 patients of Harborview Medical Center and University of Washington Medical Center, which are part of UW Medicine, has reportedly been compromised as the result of a malware attack that affected a facility computer that stored patient data. From KOMO News:
Early last month, a UW Medicine employee opened an email attachment that contained malicious software. The malware took control of the computer, which happened to be storing personal information from approximately 90,000 UW Medicine and Harborview Medical Center patients, according to a UW Medicine news release. The compromised patient data included names, phone numbers, addresses, medical record numbers and Social Security numbers, among other information. UW Medicine is now reaching out to the affected patients and has also set up a call center to work with victims.
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