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December 2015

Posted by Vijeta Uniyal on December 03, 2015 4 Comments
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban claims that Germany has struck a secret deal with Turkey to resettle 500,000 additional refugees in Europe. The revelations came just days after the EU and Turkey reached an agreement to curb the inflow of migrants. According to Prime Minister Orban, the 'secret pact', which is not part of the deal reached over the weekend, would be announced by Germany in the coming days. European leaders denied any secret deal with Ankara. However, an European Commission officials, quoted by Bloomberg, confirmed EU's intentions to bring in migrants to Europe in a "managed, open, and voluntarily process.” London-based newspaper The Independent reports:
Germany has struck a secret pact with Turkey for the European Union to take in as many as half a million Syrians currently living in Turkish refugee camps, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has claimed. While EU officials were vociferously denying the suggestions of a secret deal with Ankara, they did not dispute that efforts are being made to manage the resettlement of Syrians in Europe more efficiently. Speaking in Budapest, Mr Orban said an EU agreement on the transfer of refugees from Turkey would be announced in Berlin on 3 December or the day after. “A nasty surprise lies in wait for Europe,” he said.

Posted by Mike LaChance on December 03, 2015 10 Comments
Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel is under pressure to resign following the release of a police dash cam video of cops shooting Laquan McDonald. The video was made in October of 2014 and it's been suggested by some that it was suppressed to protect Emanuel's chances for re-election. Nick Gass reports at Politico:
Rahm Emanuel: I have no plans to resign Rahm Emanuel said Wednesday that he would not resign, despite growing criticism for what some are calling his botched response to video footage showing a Chicago police officer last year firing 16 times at Laquan McDonald, who was walking away from officers.

Posted by Leslie Eastman on December 03, 2015 7 Comments
The US Congress just gave Americans an early Christmas gift: It voted to block new EPA rules regarding coal plants!
Congress voted to block EPA carbon rules for power plants Tuesday, dealing a symbolic blow to President Barack Obama's climate change agenda just as he returns from a landmark summit in Paris. While the move will not stop the regulations at the heart of Obama's pledge to drastically cut U.S. emissions, Republicans hope they can show other world leaders that the president's successor may be unwilling to follow through on that commitment. “We want the world to know that there is disagreement with the president on this issue," said Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.), who chairs the House Energy and Power Subcommittee and helped lead the push. The House adopted two Senate-passed resolutions blocking EPA rules that apply to new and existing power plants, but the White House has already promised that Obama will veto them. The president returns to Washington Tuesday evening after attending the first two days of the United Nations negotiations in Paris aimed at producing a new global agreement to limit carbon emissions and help poor countries cope with the effects of climate change.
And while Congress may not have the votes to overcome a veto, its confirms the enormity of the failure of Obama and his plans related to the ongoing UN Climate Conference.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 02, 2015 6 Comments
AP Reports:
The Nazi soldiers made their orders very clear: Jewish American prisoners of war were to be separated from their fellow brothers in arms and sent to an uncertain fate. But Master Sgt. Roddie Edmonds would have none of that. As the highest-ranking noncommissioned officer held in the German POW camp, he ordered more than 1,000 Americans captives to step forward with him and brazenly pronounced: "We are all Jews here." He would not waver, even with a pistol to his head, and his captors eventually backed down. Seventy years later, the Knoxville, Tennessee, native is being posthumously recognized with Israel's highest honor for non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews during World War II. He's the first American serviceman to earn the honor.
The Yad Vashem news release explains further:

Posted by Sarah Rumpf on December 02, 2015 5 Comments
On Wednesday afternoon, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, on behalf of the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (Texas HHSC), filed a complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas seeking to block the resettlement of six Syrian refugees in Texas. The lawsuit names as defendants various federal entities such as the Department of State, Secretary of State John Kerry, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and HHS Secretary Sylvia Burwell, as well as International Rescue Committee, Inc., a nonprofit organization involved in refugee resettlement. According to the the complaint, the Refugee Act of 1980 (8 U.S.C. § 1522) "establishes a framework for collaboration and cooperation" between the federal government, state and local governments, and volunteer nonprofit organizations, and also requires that the federal government and these private groups "shall consult regularly" and work "in close cooperation and advance consultation" with the states about "the sponsorship process and the intended distribution of refugees among the States and localities before their placement in those States and localities.”

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on December 02, 2015 25 Comments
A shooting spree in San Bernardino resulted in the murder of at least fourteen, according to initial reports. Latest reports indicate up to 14 others were wounded and currently receiving medical treatment. Local live updates are here. Local law enforcement indicated they will provide hourly updates which you can also watch here:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 02, 2015 12 Comments
In late August we wrote about a word association survey conducted by Quinnipiac which showed the three most common words used to describe Hillary Clinton were “Liar,” “dishonest,” and “untrustworthy.” Also making high appearances were “criminal,” and “crook.” Here is that late August word cloud: Poll Word Cloud Association Hillary Quinnipiac 8-27-2015 The question at the time was whether Hillary could turn things around. Based on this study commissioned by The Washington Post, the answer appears to be not yet, and the culprit is social media, Hillary Clinton is getting crushed on social media, captured in one word cloud:

Posted by Mike LaChance on December 02, 2015 22 Comments
You may have noticed that the narrative around violent crimes changes depending on who committed the act. When someone with a Muslim sounding name is the suspect, we're repeatedly told by the media and public officials not to rush to judgement. If however, there's even the slightest chance that the perpetrator is in any way conservative, people start talking about violent Republican rhetoric and everyone right of center is suddenly urged to reexamine their views. It's a scenario we've documented on this blog multiple times: Ted Cruz is sick of this narrative and talked about the issue with Hugh Hewitt.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on December 02, 2015 2 Comments
Tuesday reports surfaced that Paris Police were advising against lighting Hanukkah candles in public places due to security concerns. The Times of Israel reported:
Miri Michaeli, Europe correspondent for Israel’s Channel 10 news, tweets a troubling report from Paris. The tweet reads, in Hebrew: “Chabad: Paris police order [us] to cancel most of our public [Hanukkah] candlelighting in the city, in light of the terror attack and the fear of additional attacks. Efforts [are underway] to approve a candlelighting at the foot of the Eiffel [Tower].”
Later (and after the headline spread internet-wide) the Times of Israel posted an update saying the original report had been retracted:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 02, 2015 42 Comments
Many campuses are seeing sets of "Demands" issued by students to administrations, often seeking to suppress speech the students deem offensive and to increase faculty and student affirmative action policies and programs. It's not surprising that the Demand movement has come to my alma mater, Hamilton College, in upstate New York. Hamilton at one time focused on the study of core subjects and Western Civilization. Over the course of the 1980s and 1990s, multiculturalism took hold of the curriculum as leftist faculty from Kirkland College (which merged with Hamilton when I was a sophomore in the late 1970s) maneuvered into positions of power. The story of how Hamilton was transformed was detailed in my post in December 2012, Western Civilization driven off campus at Hamilton College:

Posted by David Gerstman on December 02, 2015 6 Comments
Armin Rosen of Business Insider had a bombshell report on Monday about the Obama administration's diplomatic malpractice with Iran in the context of the nuclear deal announced earlier this summer. Citing a recently obtained State Department document, Rosen reported that the administration has no intention of ensuring that Iran provide the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) with all the details of its past nuclear research. Though "extensive evidence" exists that Iran had a nuclear weapons program until at least 2003, the United States has so watered down Iran's requirements for answering questions about its past nuclear work, that the IAEA  will not have a complete picture of the extent of Iran's military nuclear program. As IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano made clear earlier this week, Iran is still stonewalling. The problem is that the United States is okay with that. Rosen reported:

Posted by New Neo on December 02, 2015 6 Comments
The DNC recently took the extraordinary step of making an ad that included a clip of President Bush saying "We do not fight against Islam." In the video, the Democratic Party was using Bush to convey the idea that he was more in line with their own denials about Islamic terrorism than today's Republicans are. But, unlike today's Democrats, Bush never denied the existence of any connection between Islam and the terrorists. By distinguishing between radical (or "extremist") Islam and Islam, Bush made a distinction that was politically correct at the time and for years to come---until the Obama administration decided that Bush's formulation was unacceptable, and it was forbidden to draw the obvious connection between Islam and terrorists who said they were acting in the name of Islam. In the immediate post-9/11 weeks and months, Bush faced a very different situation than today: he was dealing with a country and a Congress playing catch-up in learning about the menace of Islamist terrorism and what it really was capable of, a need to rally together all Americans in the wake of a terrorist attack that has still never been surpassed in magnitude and daring, the very real fear of a major backlash against innocent Muslims in the US, and the goal of gaining worldwide allies (including many Muslim countries) in fighting the country that had harbored Bin Laden---Afghanistan---as well as fighting Islamic terrorists as a whole.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on December 02, 2015 15 Comments
Whether he's engaging in effective dialog with Canadian actresses or American radicals, defending religious liberty, calling out climate change hysterics, taking on the progressive media, challenging GOP leadership, or playfully pushing back against Obama's gun control agenda, Ted Cruz has a way of tackling, head on and without fear, issues that either trip up other Republicans or that they avoid like the plague. This week, Cruz countered the Democrat accusation that the GOP is engaged in a "war on women" by asserting that the GOP is not "the condom police." CNN reports:
Iowans at a town hall waded into awkward territory on Monday evening as Ted Cruz tackled a question on contraceptives.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 01, 2015 5 Comments
I reported on November 22, 2015, that local Ithaca, NY, anti-Israel activists were objecting to the appearance of American Jewish reggae musician Matisyahu, Anti-Israel boycott movement targets Matisyahu again. The appearance is scheduled for this Friday night, December 4, 2015. That post had the history of how Matisyahu has been singled out for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement scorn because he is an American Jew who refuses to renounce and denounce Israel. In fact, Matisyahu has expressed support for Israel's right to exist and has come out against media demonization of Israel. That makes Matisyahu a marked man by BDS, and led to cancellation of his appearance last August at the Spanish Rototom Reggae Festival. The ban was reversed after a public outcry and Spanish government and media denunciations of religious discrimination. I also detailed how the local protest was organized by the same core group of people who organize just about every anti-Israel event in the Ithaca area, particularly Ariel Gold. Matisyahu - Ithaca State Street Theater At the end of my prior post, I noted:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 01, 2015 18 Comments
This is one of those things that just leave you shaking your head. And it's an important lesson of why Israel can't lose any war -- there would be no mercy shown on the Jews. In early September we covered the anniversary of the 1972 Munich Massacre, in which 11 Israelis were murdered by PLO terrorists who took them hostage in the Olympic Village. Mahmoud Abbas, current President of the Palestinian Authority, reportedly financed the operation. https://youtu.be/4nOnRbTlWs0?t=32s Here are the images of the Israelis who died:

Posted by Miriam Elman on December 01, 2015 13 Comments
Last week on November 22, Al-Awda—the Palestine Right to Return Coalition—proudly announced on Twitter the co-hosting, with Jewish Voice for Peace and others, of Alison Weir at an event in Cleveland: https://twitter.com/AlAwdaPRRC/status/668583974948741120 It isn’t surprising that Al-Awda would take the lead in promoting Weir and her group and website If Americans Knew (IAK). The two organizations are basically cut from the same cloth. According to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), Al-Awda is a notorious anti-Israel campaigner that views Zionism as “inherently racist” and is unwilling to accept Israel’s existence.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on December 01, 2015 21 Comments
In a letter to the student body, the president of Oklahoma Wesleyan University said what we've all been saying -- stop whining! Dr. Everett Piper penned a public letter to university students where, among other glorious bits of wisdom, he advised, "Oklahoma Wesleyan is not a “safe place”, but rather, a place to learn: to learn that life isn’t about you." clapping-crowd-applause Protests at college campuses across the country have highlighted the alarming degree to which the modern university protester is disconnected from planet Earth. Dr. Piper, it would seem, has had enough. He wrote:
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