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Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 19, 2014 10 Comments
I don't know much about Indian politics, so I haven't written about the election sweep which threw out the long-dominant Congress Party. I do know that successive Indian governments have had at times contradictory relations with with Israel; not as crazed anti-Israel as many, but not solidly on Israel's side either. Indian-born writer Vijeta Uniyal believes that the election signals a sea change both politically and economically, with India looking to Israel for technology and investment to jump start the moribund Indian economy, India’s PM-elect Narendra Modi: a friend of Israel:
Narendra Modi is the next Prime Minister of India. Modi’s NDA-Alliance won 336 out of 543 seats in the Indian parliament. He has routed the ruling Congress Party led by Rahul Gandhi, the 4th generation member of Nehru-Gandhi dynasty Modi is arguably one of the most capable administrators in India. As Chief Minister of Gujarat State (2002-14) he turned around the economy, created infrastructure and improved public services. With a population of 60 million, Gujarat’s per-capita GDP today is much higher than India’s average. A lot of ink has been spilled in the international press over this relatively unknown man now at the helm in New Delhi. However there is one story readers in Israel need to hear: Modi is a friend of Israel, the like of whom India has not seen before. This fact can be stated without any exaggeration or wishful thinking. All one needs to do is to look at Modi’s track record. Modi is the first Indian leader to have actually visited Israel. He has often expressed admiration for Israel’s achievements in research, technology and innovation; espacially in the field of agriculture and water resources. Every year more than 2000 farmers from Gujarat visit Israel to get trained in advance farming techniques – at their own expense. He welcomed Israeli Companies to enter water management and recycling sector in 50 cities of Gujarat; and invited Israel to be the guest country at Gujarat state’s flagship Agricultural Fair (Vibrant Gujarat Agro Tech Global Fair 2014).

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Posted by A.F. Branco on May 19, 2014 3 Comments

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Posted by CampusClimatologist on May 18, 2014 6 Comments
On Thursday night, UCLA's student government judicial board heard Students for Justice in Palestine v. Singh and Students for Justice in Palestine v. Rogers, both alleging that members of UCLA's  student government (USAC) who are against the Boycott Sanction and Divest (BDS) movement  took inappropriate gifts from pro-Israel organizations and should have recused themselves from the anti-Israel Divestment vote, which lost 7-5. While on its face, this hearing concerned ethics rules, this case is the start of a national movement to make support for Israel costly or prohibited on college campuses, UCLA testing ground for next generation of anti-Israel campus tactics. Jared Sichel, a reporter for the Jewish Journal, Los Angeles' local Jewish newspaper, comments (as both Professor Jacobson and I have also noted in the past) that however the board rules, SJP has succeeded in  "making it costly to be pro-Israel at UCLA." Screenshot 2014-05-18 13.33.58 Now, everyone seeking office who goes on a trip to Israel or is associated with a pro-Israel organization may be accused of having a conflict of interest boxing them out of key positions that vote on divestment matters. SJP is building a chilling effect, showing that those who stand in their way will be subject to long hours of debate, protest, and even "legal" hearings.  Some may not agree with SJP, but consider it not worth the trouble to stand in their way.

Posted by Mandy Nagy on May 18, 2014 3 Comments
Tensions between China and Vietnam have recently escalated after more than two weeks of conflict over a territorial dispute in the South China Sea. From CNN:
China has evacuated more than 3,000 of its citizens from Vietnam and is sending ships to retrieve more of them after deadly anti-Chinese violence erupted last week over a territorial dispute between the two countries. Five Chinese ships will travel to Vietnam to help with the evacuation, the official Chinese news agency Xinhua reported Sunday, citing the Ministry of Transport. One of the ships has already set off from the southern island province of Hainan, the ministry said. Sixteen critically injured Chinese citizens were flown out of Vietnam on Sunday morning on a chartered medical plane organized by Chinese authorities, Xinhua said. Two Chinese citizens were killed and more than 100 others were injured in the violence that hit parts of Vietnam last week, according to the news agency. Some of the worst violence appeared to have taken place in the central coastal province of Ha Tinh. Foreign factories, particularly those run by companies from China and Taiwan, were burned and looted by rioters outraged over Beijing's decision to send an oil rig into waters of the South China Sea that both countries claim as sovereign territory.
Protests are usually not permitted in Vietnam, but were initially allowed until violence erupted and the situation grew out of control, according to CNN.  Authorities there are now trying to stop the protests.  Reuters reports that police in a few areas of Vietnam on Sunday were directing those gathering for rallies to disperse. The conflict began earlier this month when China first parked the aforementioned oil rig in the disputed waters, triggering back and forth demands from both sides to retreat. From the Associated Press via Yahoo News:

Posted by David Gerstman on May 18, 2014 2 Comments
In 1994 terrorists struck the Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA) in Buenos Aires, Argentina. 85 people were killed. In 2003, an Argentine judge issued arrest warrants for four Iranian officials (but denied warrants for twelve others) for their involvement in the terror attack. In 2007 INTERPOL, an international police organization, issued warrants for five Iranians and one Lebanese for the involvement in the AMIA bombing. Early last year Argentina's government reached an agreement with Iran to form a "truth commission" to investigate those who were responsible. The agreement was immediately controversy because, in the words of former Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon, it was "inviting the murderer to participate in the murder investigation.” Last week, an Argentine federal court struck down last year's "truth commission" agreement with Iran to investigate the AMIA bombing. Several senior Iranian officials and Hezbollah have been implicated in the attack that killed 85 people in that Jewish community center.
Thursday's ruling declared the agreement unconstitutional and ordered Argentina not to go ahead with it. The deal had been delayed anyway by Iranian reluctance to move forward in implementing it. ... Israel and world Jewish groups had denounced the "truth commission" deal with Iran, calling it a diplomatic win for Tehran that offered no benefit to Argentina. The deal would have let Iran review Argentina's investigation into the bombing.
Alberto Nisman, the prosecutor who took over investigation of the case, established responsibility to the highest level of Iran's government. Among those implicated were then President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Iran's previous defense minister Ahmed Vahidi. Vahidi and intelligence officer Moshen Rabbani were among five Iranians who were flagged by INTERPOL for arrest in the case. (Video from March 2013) While current Iranian President was a member of the group that ordered the attack, Nisman told David Horovitz of the Times of Israel last year that Rouhani was not present at the meeting where the attack was planned. An English version Nisman's indictment is here (PDF). An op-ed in the New York Times at the time of the Argentine-Iranian agreement accused Argentina's government of doing "an about-face on terror."

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 18, 2014 26 Comments
Sarah Palin, who also was Governor of Alaska at the time of her nomination for Veep, was excoriated by the mainstream media for her stint as Mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, with the argument being that her job only involved overseeing a few departments.  It was less than worthless experience, the meme went. So Julian Castro, Mayor of San Antonio, is being groomed for a potential Veep slot in 2016 through a cabinet appointment, as discussed yesterday, Mayor of San Antonio one heartbeat away from the presidency? I assumed that the position of Mayor of San Antonio was a serious job, like being the Mayor of many other big cities.  While a spot on a presidential ticket for someone who never was more than a Mayor would be unusual, we have had Mayors like Rudy Guiliani make presidential runs. I gave Castro the benefit of the doubt on managerial and policy experience.  I was wrong. It turns out that being Mayor of San Antonio involves no more responsibility than being Mayor of Wasilla, and maybe less. Byron York reports, in a column focused mostly on Castro's big payday from a politically connected trial law firm, that being Mayor of San Antonio is nothing more than a superficial public relations position which pays even less than much-abused adjunct professors get paid:
San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro is widely referred to as a "rising star" in Democratic politics. There's even talk the Mexican-American Castro could earn the vice-presidential spot on the 2016 Democratic ticket in an effort to further strengthen the party's bonds with Hispanic voters. And now, it appears Castro's national profile is about to rise with word that President Obama plans to nominate him to be Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. If Castro is tapped for the job, his Senate confirmation hearings will likely shine a spotlight both on his role in San Antonio's government and his way of making a living. San Antonio, the second-largest city in Texas and seventh-largest in the nation, has a council-manager-weak mayor form of government. The manager runs the city. "The office of the city manager serves as the focal point for the executive leadership and direction of the city organization," says the website of San Antonio City Manager Sheryl Sculley. The site says Sculley, in office seven years, has "appointed executive leadership, reorganized city departments, streamlined city business systems, improved customer service and elevated the professionalism of city management." Sculley makes $355,000 a year, one of the highest salaries for a local office in Texas.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 18, 2014 16 Comments
The fragile college student mind is getting more fragile by the day. As if the normal run of political correctness were not enough, we now have "Trigger Warnings" -- the notion that students need to be warned that the material they are about to read in class may "trigger" emotional upset. The concept has been growing on campuses over the past couple of years.  The New York Times reports:
Colleges across the country this spring have been wrestling with student requests for what are known as “trigger warnings,” explicit alerts that the material they are about to read or see in a classroom might upset them or, as some students assert, cause symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder in victims of rape or in war veterans. The warnings, which have their ideological roots in feminist thought, have gained the most traction at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where the student government formally called for them. But there have been similar requests from students at Oberlin College, Rutgers University,the University of Michigan, George Washington University and other schools. The debate has left many academics fuming, saying that professors should be trusted to use common sense and that being provocative is part of their mandate. Trigger warnings, they say, suggest a certain fragility of mind that higher learning is meant to challenge, not embrace. The warnings have been widely debated in intellectual circles and largely criticized in opinion magazines, newspaper editorials and academic email lists. “Any kind of blanket trigger policy is inimical to academic freedom,” said Lisa Hajjar, a sociology professor at the university here, who often uses graphic depictions of torture in her courses about war. “Any student can request some sort of individual accommodation, but to say we need some kind of one-size-fits-all approach is totally wrong. The presumption there is that students should not be forced to deal with something that makes them uncomfortable is absurd or even dangerous.”
Of course, how the trigger is defined says much about the theory behind the movement -- it almost always serves left-wing critical race and gender theories, as at Oberlin, as the Times further reports:

Posted by Mike LaChance on May 18, 2014 9 Comments
Republican Lee Zeldin is running for congress in New York and is an Iraq War veteran. That didn't stop the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee from accusing Zeldin of being a coward. Alex Pappas of the Daily Caller reported:
In a post on its website, the campaign arm of the House Democrats is asking whether Republican Lee Zeldin is being cowardly about Republican Rep. Paul Ryan’s budget. “Over a month after his House Republicans passed Paul Ryan’s reckless budget, Congressional Candidate Lee Zeldin is still too scared to admit how he would vote for the plan, even though he wants Long Islanders to send him to Congress,” the DCCC said in a release. “Even though every member of Congress had no choice but to vote yes or no weeks ago, what’s taking him so long to decide? There’s only one answer: Zeldin is either woefully uninformed, willfully ignorant or a coward.”
Zeldin responded on FOX News. Comments and video via NewsBusters:
Well, you have some liberal Democrat hack who is hiding behind his Twitter account, stuffs his face with cheese doodles, sending out press releases on DCCC letterhead, shameful attacks. And the fact is Nancy Pelosi, Steve Israel, Tim Bishop, they've never served a day, and I think when I was sitting at the door on that Blackhawk and the drill master hits the back of your head, and you do what's so unnatural, jumping out with your parachute, here you are, fast forward to today and you have these Democratic hacks out of Washington who want to change the subject and fling insults, saying that I'm a coward. It just doesn't fit.
Here's the video: Democrats now are retreating from the claim, as reported at Newsday:

Posted by Mike LaChance on May 18, 2014 21 Comments
After New York State passed the "SAFE Act" gun control law, there were fears that Remington Arms, a major employer in the economically depressed upstate area would leave. Slowly, that appears to be happening.  First, Remington announced it was opening a plant in Alabama, for future expansion.  But politicians assured us that the jobs in Upstate were safe. Now we learn that Remington is moving two production lines out of New York to Alabama, and the jobs are going with them. The Buffalo News reports...
Remington to move production of two gun lines from New York to Alabama Nearly 200 years after Eliphalet Remington II forged his first rifle in Ilion, residents of the small central New York village are getting the bad news they have feared for more than a year: Remington Arms is moving production of two of its gun lines to Alabama. While the company did not announce the outright closing of the facility that has been home to Remington since 1816, gun rights advocates said that day is now likely moving closer and they blame the state’s 2013 NY SAFE Act gun control law. “This could very well be the beginning of the end of Ilion,’’ said Tom King, president of the New York State Rifle and Pistol Association, the state chapter for the National Rifle Association.
Syracuse.com is reporting that even if workers want to move, there's no guarantee they can keep their jobs...

Posted by Mandy Nagy on May 17, 2014 6 Comments

Follows passing of Bush family dog Barney, who died last year....

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 17, 2014 12 Comments
I've seen this coming for a couple of years. Julian Castro, the Mayor of San Antonio, reportedly is being nominated for a Cabinet post to give him the credentials to be Hillary's Veep pick. San Antonio Mayor Julián Castro Is Said to Be HUD Pick in Cabinet Reshuffling:
President Obama is preparing to nominate Mayor Julián Castro of San Antonio as his new secretary of housing and urban development, elevating one of his party’s Hispanic rising stars as part of a cabinet shuffle that has possible implications for the 2016 presidential race, Democrats informed about the plans said on Saturday. Mr. Castro, who has often been mentioned as a potential vice-presidential candidate for the Democrats, would take the place of Shaun Donovan, who would become director of the Office of Management and Budget.... Mr. Castro, 39, won national attention in 2012 as the keynote speaker at the Democratic National Convention, and he and his twin brother, Representative Joaquin Castro, Democrat of Texas, have become popular speakers on the party’s fund-raising circuit. Mr. Obama and the Democrats have predicated their future electoral hopes on appealing to the country’s growing Hispanic population as House Republicans have blocked their efforts to overhaul the immigration system.
Scott Conrad also saw this coming, writing in August 2013, Vice President Julian Castro?:

Posted by Mike LaChance on May 17, 2014 7 Comments
A better question might be should Dr. Ben Carson run for president? It's no secret that Dr. Carson enjoys tremendous support from American conservatives. When he spoke at CPAC in March of this year, the audience was sprinkled with signs which read "Run Ben, Run" but that doesn't necessarily form the basis of a campaign. Then again, maybe it does. Fred Barnes of the Weekly Standard recently reported...
Ben Carson Moves Toward Presidential Run Ben Carson is warming to the idea of running for president. Since the famous brain surgeon retired last year from Johns Hopkins Hospital, he’s been speaking around the country to enthusiastic audiences. And they’ve affected his thinking about seeking national office. “Over the years, there have been many attempts to get me to throw my hat in the political arena,” Carson writes in his new book, One Nation: What We Can All Do to Save America’s Future. “I have been offered support from around the country and tremendous financial resources if I decide to run for national office. But I have not felt the call to run.”
Ramesh Ponnuru offered a counterpoint at Bloomberg News...

Posted by Leslie Eastman on May 17, 2014 8 Comments
As surely as night follows day, a natural disaster will be followed by the assertions of environmental activists that it was caused by "man-made climate change." At this point, six of the now 11 wildfires raging through San Diego county are fully contained. And before the embers have begun to cool, California Governor Jerry Brown offered his eco-activist assessment of its cause.
On Thursday, Governor Jerry Brown asserted that it is settled that climate change is a factor in the wildfires now devastating parts of San Diego County. According to a story in the U-T San Diego, the governor opined, “Despite what you may hear in Washington, climate change is a factor… This is not about theory. It’s not about politics. This is about fires on the ground, people’s homes.” ..Brown, a staunch advocate of climate change theory, recently confirmed that Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) is in danger of being overwhelmed by floods due to global warming.
Actually, it looks like some of the wildfires may, indeed, be "man-caused disasters." But not in the way Brown thinks. The Bernardo Fire was caused by a backhoe:
A backhoe in use at a housing construction project near Rancho Bernardo sparked the first large wildfire to erupt in San Diego County this week, authorities reported Friday.
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