THERE IS NO PEACE WITH THE RELIGION OF PEACE

(MUHAMMAD HAMED/REUTERS)

England is going through never-ending problems with its Muslims.

When I say England, I mean England.  The same thing does not apply yet in Wales and Scotland or Northern Ireland.

Many of us have seen it coming for decades.   It took the Hamas-Israel conflict to bring it to a head.  Almost immediately after the brutal attack by Hamas on October 7^th, hundreds of thousands of Muslims started demonstrating for Palestine on the streets of London.  They totally ignored the atrocities committed by Hamas.  They also ignored laws that already existed, against calls for genocide and against disorderly conduct in the demonstration itself.    Statues of famous Londoners were damaged.  It was as if a hostile army had entered the capital, ready to kill and destroy.

Every Saturday since the Hamas attack these demonstrations have gone on, making life very inconvenient for Londoners.     This has particularly affected Jews who no longer feel safe in London.   It’s not just because of physical abuse.  There are also the illegal chants that overwhelm other voices.  “From the river to the sea” is an illegal chant because it calls for the genocide of the Jews in the Holy Land.      But these people are lawless.

How did Britain get here?

Before 1945 the United Kingdom was made up of Anglo-Saxons and Celts, with a little smattering of Jews and others.  This was to change dramatically in the postwar years.   The British people were never consulted about this.   The change was simply imposed on them.   It wasn’t until the Blair and Brown governments elected in 1997 and the early 2000’s that the alarm went off as millions of new arrivals arrived from just about everywhere.  This has totally changed the character of Britain.   Social cohesion is now sadly lacking.   Levels of crime have increased alarmingly.  Much of this can be blamed on Blair and Brown, but not all.  Every government since World War II contributed to this.   It has even been suggested that these two men be put on trial, as what they did with their open borders destroyed the country!

Now, British people are starting to think that this social ‘experiment’ is costing them a fortune.

There has never been an attempt to determine how cost effective this has all been.   But the fact is that the majority of people who enter the UK from other countries are largely poor and uneducated.   The government covers all medical costs and the cost of their children’s education immediately.  They are also entitled to welfare.   It’s not surprising that tens of thousands by-pass France and head straight for Britain.

Most people do not assimilate.   They don’t even try.  They retain their own customs.    This includes millions of Muslims.

Hosea 7:9-10 King James Version (KJV) “Strangers have devoured his strength, and he knoweth it not: yea, gray hairs are here and there upon him, yet he knoweth not. And the pride of Israel testifieth to his face: and they do not return to the LORD their God, nor seek him for all this.”  This verse aptly describes modern Israel.

An additional problem with Muslims is their intolerance.   On Monday night of this week Douglas Murray, an anti-Muslim speaker, was to address a crowd of people at the Apollo Theater in London.   This was to be a mainly Jewish crowd.      Muslims turned up and stopped the meeting from ever taking place.      Censorship and threats of violence are the main contributions of “the religion of peace.”

London has become inhospitable to non-Muslims.  The mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, is a Muslim of Pakistani descent who, some have said, is in league with “militants”.   There is not much hope of replacing him at the next election, demographics being what they are.

Finally, it needs to be said that most of Britain’s leaders are cowards when it comes to dealing with these problems.  Faced with the rising influence of Islam, the government is going to build a memorial in London to all the Muslims who fought with Britain in World War II.  This will honor the men of the British Indian Army.   The government is also donating 117 million pounds (approximately 150 million dollars) to help strengthen security at the country’s mosques.   Christian churches need it more, but they were not offered a penny.   Another illustration of cowardice is that dozens of MPs (members of parliament) are not going to seek re-election this year.   Following the murders of two MPs by “extremists,” one white and one Muslim, the appeal of parliament is waning.

The Muslim problem will not go away and is likely to get worse particularly as nobody wants to tackle the problem of immigration.  An election this year will likely see Labor (the socialists) back in power who will just ignore it.   If something is not done quickly this could be the death of England.   Seriously.  

Prophesying of Israel in the last days, God warns: “The foreigners living among you will become stronger and stronger, while you become weaker and weaker. They will lend money to you, but you will not lend to them. They will be the head, and you will be the tail!” (Deut 28:43-44)

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GAMBIA CONTEMPLATES GIANT LEAP BACKWARDS

Gambia’s National Assembly voted Monday to advance a bill repealing the country’s ban on female genital cutting. The vote sent the bill to committee, buying opponents three months before repealing the ban is up for a final vote. If it passes, Gambia will become the first nation to roll back protections against cutting, potentially setting a dangerous precedent for other countries.

Over 75% of women in Gambia experience cutting, which usually involves removing the clitoris and labia minora of girls between the ages of 10 and 15 and often leads to infection and life-threatening complications during childbirth.

The practice was banned in 2015 but only enforced for the first-time last year. After three practitioners were fined, influential imams in the Muslim-majority country called to repeal the ban, claiming that cutting is religiously and culturally important.

Anti-cutting campaigners protested outside Parliament during the vote, but only religious leaders and their supporters advocating for the repeal were granted entrance. Out of the 47 lawmakers present, 42 voted to advance the repeal in a parliament with only five women.

Opponents of the bill fear that if the ban is repealed, other laws protecting women and girls, like the ban on child marriage, will be next. (Gzero Signal, 3/19/2024)

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TURMOIL IN CUBA AS FOOD SHORTAGES BITE

Extended blackouts and food scarcity drove Cubans into the streets of Santiago, the Caribbean country’s second-largest city, on Monday, in rare and risky protests. President Miguel Díaz-Canelblamed the US trade embargo for shortages and warned that American “terrorists” were fomenting dissent.

Cuba depends heavily on its allies, Russia and Venezuela, for food and fuel, but the island’s rumbling economic crisis means each peso fails to go as far as it once did. The government raised prices on fuel by over 400% at the start of March as part of an effort to stabilize the economy and control spiraling inflation, which officially topped 30% (though the real rate is likely higher).

Havana is now receiving aid from the World Food Bank for the first time, after requesting help in a rare acknowledgment that the country can’t feed itself. Now, blackouts of up to 18 hours a day mean that ordinary folks can’t refrigerate what food they do have, and instead watch it spoil in tropical weather. Over 400,000 people have fled to the US in the two and a half years since the last major economic protests.

We’re watching for signs of unrest spreading to other cities, and for how hard Havana cracks down on dissent.  (Gzero Signal, 3/19/2024)

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BRITISH ISLES BRIEFS

Leo Varadkar is to step down as Taoiseach and as leader of his party, Fine Gael. In an announcement this lunchtime in Dublin, Varadkar said he would quit as party leader with immediate effect but stay in the role of Taoiseach until his successor is appointed. Explaining his decision, Varadkar cited ‘personal and political reasons’ as to why ‘after careful consideration and soul searching, I don’t feel I’m the best person for the job anymore.’  (The Spectator, 3/20/2024)

Bristol, England – has seen more than its share of knife crime.   The police are now giving young boys a survival kit, to help them help others who have been stabbed.    They will be able to stop the bleeding until the ambulance arrives.

All three of the kingdoms that comprise Great Britain are now led by immigrants.   It may be four in a week or two when Ireland replaces Leo Varadkar.  Great Britain is the first European entity to experience this.  It’s too much of a coincidence!

On Monday March 11^th, Lee Anderson, a Conservative Member of Parliament, defected to the new Reform Party, becoming the Reform Party’s first sitting MP.   As Mr. Anderson said, “I just want my country back.” 

ALBANIAN INVASION

The home secretary, Suella Braverman, in parliament on 31 October, where she spoke of an ‘invasion’ on the south coast. (Photograph: Jessica Taylor/UK Parliament/AFP/Getty Images)

For hundreds of years, Great Britain had the biggest navy in the world.   It kept all invaders out of the British Isles and kept them away from Britain’s vast colonial empire as well.  Chief amongst its enemies were Spain and France, two Catholic powers that wanted to restore Britain to the church.  More recently, there was Germany.   In two world wars Britain kept the German invader out and maintained the country’s independence.

But everything is different now.  The Royal Navy was the great protector of Great Britain, keeping out the Germans, before them, the French and Spanish.  But now they are being defeated by an irregular force of Albanians, who, apparently want to expand their criminal activities to England (human trafficking, gambling and drugs).   At least one thousand people a week arrive in dinghies, claiming asylum.  It should be noted here that there is absolutely no reason for them to seek asylum, as Albania is a democracy.  It’s been a member of NATO since 2009.  And since most arrivals are young men (and not women and children), these new arrivals are clearly economic migrants, simply out to better themselves.

The RNLI (Royal National Lifeboat Institution) rescues them, gives them a hot cup of tea, and brings them safely to shore where they are then housed in 3- or 4-star hotels at tax-payer expense.  They are given three meals a day and 38 pounds spending money a week. This, at a time when many people in Britain do not have enough to eat.

Suella Braverman, Home Secretary (Interior Minister) in the UK, described what is happening as an “invasion.”   She was criticized in parliament for using that word, but what word should she use?   The waves of immigrants in recent years are changing Great Britain out of recognition; making it worse is that people have been silenced through repressive laws that limit their freedom to speak on this issue.

Once again, Britain is asking the French to help stop the flow.  They are to pay France 72.2 million euros (the dollar and the euro are on a par right now), up from 63 million last year.    One question: If it didn’t work then, why should it work now?

A solution might be to bring some royal naval commanders out of retirement.  They will know what to do and take great pleasure in doing it!

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PS:  It’s just been announced that only 46% of the British people, in a recent survey, consider themselves Christian.   In the US it’s 71% Coincidentally, my electronic Bible opened up at the following verse this morning: “The LORD your God will bless you in the land he is giving you. The LORD will establish you as his holy people, as he promised you on oath, if you keep the commands of the LORD your God and walk in his ways. Then all the peoples on earth will see that you are called by the name of the LORD, and they will fear you. ” (Deut 28)

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US MIDTERMS

The Republicans had a disappointing electoral result in the Midterms.   Inflation did not turn people against the Democrats.   Many commentators said it was the female vote that did it.  More specifically women who support abortion.

For the GOP, it’s an opportunity to launch investigations on stuff like the origins of COVID, the chaotic US withdrawal from Afghanistan, and the Republicans’ favorite target: Biden’s own son, Hunter. It might even lead to impeaching the president. On foreign policy, expect the GOP to penny-pinch US aid to Ukraine and make Congress get even tougher on China — perhaps not the best idea after Biden and Xi Jinping decided to cool things down at the G-20 in Bali.  (Gzero Signal, 11/17/2022)

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UN Mideast envoy warns West Bank ‘reaching a boiling point’ The UN special coordinator for the Middle East peace process, Tor Wennesland, warns the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is “reaching a boiling point.”  (Times of Israel, by Luke Tress, 28 Nov 2022)

“The high level of violence in the occupied West Bank and Israel in recent months including attacks against Israeli and Palestinian civilians,” Wennesland says, “have caused grave human suffering.”  

“The targeting of civilians can never be justified and the violence must stop,” Wennesland says at a Security Council briefing, calling for a return to a political process for a resolution to the conflict.  He condemns the recent terror attacks in Jerusalem and Ariel, as well as settler violence against Palestinians in Hebron.  He warns that “demography is moving faster than politics,” and that the rapid population growth in Gaza and the West Bank will make it “increasingly difficult” to manage the conflict.  The US ambassador to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, condemns the terror attacks against Israelis and settler violence.  The US “is deeply concerned about the sharp escalation,” Thomas-Greenfield says. “This has been the deadliest year in the West Bank since 2004.”  She condemns the Palestinian Authority’s payments to terrorists and the “disruption to the historic status quo of holy sites.”  Thomas-Greenfield blasts the UN for its “lopsided focus” on Israel, including the open-ended Commission of Inquiry and the request for the International Court of Justice to weigh in on the conflict.  “The UN system is replete with anti-Israel actions and bodies,” she says. “Instead of grandstanding and pursuing unproductive measures, we hope the UN will start focusing on concrete steps that improve the lives of Israelis and Palestinians.” 

(https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog-november-28-2022/)

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BERLIN AND THE “UKRAINIAN HOLOCAUST”

The German Bundestag wants to declare the 1932/33 famine in Ukraine a genocide and is thus adopting a politically motivated classification from the milieu of the former Ukrainian Nazi collaboration. As research by historians shows, the claim that the famine was a deliberately planned “Ukrainian Holocaust” originated within the Ukrainian exile community in Canada, where former Nazi-collaborators set the tone. In the late 1980s, this claim was subsumed under the newly coined term “Holdomor.”  Historians overwhelmingly reject this claim, particularly because the famine affected the populations of agrarian regions throughout the Soviet Union. The Bundestag plans to pass its resolution on the “Holdomor” already on Wednesday. This also threatens to have serious domestic consequences. Last Friday the Bundesrat had approved the recent tightening of §130 of the German penal code, according to which “the public condoning, denying, or grossly trivializing” of war crimes and genocide will be punishable by law.   (German Foreign Policy, 11/28/2022)

BAD DAY FOR AMERICA

There’s too much simplistic reasoning following the demonstration in DC and subsequent riot in the Capitol yesterday.

Most media outlets blamed the riot on one man:  Donald Trump.    Yet, we’ve had on-going riots for months in many cities around the US.    Portland, Miami, Seattle, Los Angeles, New York City to name a few.   In Portland in August, a right-winger was shot dead by somebody on the opposing side. 

Most of these riots have involved organizations like Antifa and Black Lives Matter.    Noticeably absent was any condemnation by Democrats.  
This is very much a case of “those who live by the sword, shall die by the sword” (Matt 26:52).   Until ALL violence is condemned by ALL politicians (and ALL media), this will not end.  Even if that happens, the causes behind the riots will still be there.   Joe Biden’s legislative priorities are only likely to inspire more violence.

As for yesterday’s events, why wasn’t security more effective at the Capitol?    Police removed the barricades to let people in and some even had selfies taken with the demonstrators.   If security had been better, it’s likely that none of the four deaths would have happened.  As Liz Harrington, a reporter for NewsMax, said this morning: “This is one of the most secure buildings on the planet.”   What went wrong?

And let’s not exaggerate what happened.   The crowd was estimated to be in the hundreds of thousands; the number who actually got into the Capitol was variously estimated to be between 500-1,000.   Most demonstrators were peaceful and well-behaved. And they all vacated the streets when Trump asked them to do so.

The Capitol has seen violence before.   In the twenty years leading up to the Civil War, there were 70 violent incidents in the Capitol itself.  There needs to be a much greater effort all around to avoid another Civil War!
As has often been said in the last few hours, this was a bad day for America.   But it has come after a year of bad days.

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A COMING CRASH OF CURRENCIES

With countries throwing money around like an alcoholic in a casino, how long is it going to be before our countries go broke?   Actually, they already are!  But the day is coming when other nations will not accept dollars (or pounds) as payment for goods.   When that happens, international trade will grind to a halt.  Governments know no restraint.   $500 million for gender studies in Pakistan?   Paid for by the US taxpayer.    It’s insane.  Especially at this time.

We could also have extremely high rates of inflation, making the money in our pockets worthless.

Apart from historical accounts of the perils of high inflation (such as Germany in 1923), the best words on the subject are found in the biblical Book of Haggai 1:6, NIV:  “You have planted much, but harvested little. You eat, but never have enough. You drink, but never have your fill. You put on clothes but are not warm. You earn wages, only to put them in a purse with holes in it.”    Inflation is certainly like having a purse with holes in it.

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SAD STATE OF PUBLIC LIBRARIES

Our public library remains closed.

I can remember a time when all you needed to check out a book was a library card.   That was it.  With your card you could take home anything and keep it for three weeks.  Now you need a card that’s electronically friendly, or you must memorize the last six digits of the number on the back.   My wife and daughter cannot check out items I’ve requested because of some law passed years ago.   And now books have to be held for a week in “quarantine.”   When they give you your books in the parking lot you must have a rear window open so they can throw them in, in a white plastic bag.  All this for $200 every six months in my property taxes (I could buy ten books for that amount of money!)   It seems awfully cloak and dagger and has taken the joy out of going to the library.

WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE

Apparently, 90 gendarmes in France are employed (and paid for) by the British tax-payer to try and keep out the tens of thousands of migrants trying to get into the UK.

Following the recent Brexit deal, France is to employ an additional 700 officials to process all the paperwork the new deal is causing.

There was less paperwork before the EU.  So why is there more now the UK has left?    Perhaps the ports are run by the libraries!

POST BREXIT DEAL

The British signed a new trade deal with the EU just a few days before the deadline of New Years Eve.   It leaves Northern Ireland (a province of the UK) under partial EU control.   Gibraltar is to be a member of the Schengen travel area, again tying them somewhat to the EU.   Fisheries was another major area of compromise.   My hometown of Grimsby on the east coast is unlikely to see a return to pre-EEC conditions.   Back then, it was the greatest fishing port in the world.

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PLEASE TELL ME WHY

In the rest of the world, left-of-centre political parties are depicted by a red color.   Conservative parties are blue.  In the US, it’s the opposite.  Can anybody tell me why?

In most countries Conservative parties are against guns and for gun control.  In the US, it’s definitely the other way around.  Can anybody tell me why?   (Following a massacre in New Zealand, a leftist party passed strict gun controls.   But that’s the only exception to the rule.)

Why does America put the month first before the day and year on forms?  All airports in America are required to fill out forms that follow the international practice of day, month and year.   Why is it different on domestic forms?

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From the Lansing State Journal

“More murders in 2020, and far more shootings,” (Lansing State Journal, 12/31/20).  

“Non-fatal shootings in Lansing nearly doubled in 2020 and homicides are at a three-decade high from surging violent crime in the second half of the year.  

Lansing Police Chief Daryl Green said many aggravated assaults and shootings have stemmed from minor disagreements.  When the fight escalates, those involved may turn to their guns.  And the more aggravated assaults that occur, the greater the chance there is for a homicide,” Green said.  “A lot of people are hurting . . .   A lot don’t know how to actually mitigate and lessen disagreement.  The conflict mediation portion of things is really an area we probably need to explore to move forward.”

“Starting January 20, the Biden administration will be responsible for  addressing three major public health crisis:   the coronavirus pandemic, which has killed more than 330,000 Americans and infected more than 17 million;  the mental health crisis, which the pandemic has exacerbated to the point that 40% of US residents now report struggling  with mental or behavioral health issues; and the drug overdose crisis, with 81,000 deaths in the 12 months ending in May 2020, the highest ever recorded in a year-long period.   As President-elect Joe Biden knows, addiction is a mental health disorder characterized by recurring substance use, feelings of social isolation, hopelessness and obsessive thinking.”  (Lansing State Journal, 1/3/21) 

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Indigenous people across the US want their land back – and the movement is gaining momentum
by Harmeet Kaur, CNN, Updated 1845 GMT (0245 HKT) Nov 25, 2020

Around this time every year, Americans come together to share a feast commemorating a myth about its first inhabitants.  An indigenous tribe did eat with the Pilgrims in 1621 and sign a treaty with the colonists that had settled on their shores – an act of survival rather than one of goodwill and friendship.  But the relationship would eventually break down, decimating the tribe’s population and whittling away its land.

Nearly 400 years later, the descendants of the very tribe at the heart of the Thanksgiving holiday are still fighting to reclaim their lands – a fight that ironically hinges on whether or not the tribe meets the federal government’s definition of “Indian.”

“We’re kind of stereotyped as the tribes that met the Pilgrims and that’s our whole history, like we ceased to exist in 1621,” said Robert Maxim, a citizen of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe.  “That couldn’t be further from the truth.”

(https://edition.cnn.com/2020/11/25/us/indigenous-people-reclaiming-their-lands-trnd/index.html)

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Neo-Nazis And White Supremacists Mark Christmas By Freely Posting On Telegram, VK, And Parler:  Promoting Violence, ‘Dreaming Of A White Christmas,’ And Wishing Jews ‘Happy Holocaust’

Panelist At A Heated Wife-Beating Debate On Lebanese TV:  I Want My Husband To Beat Me; Other Guest:  If My Wife Refuses Me, I Will Rape Her, Douse Her In Gasoline, Light Her On Fire  (MEMRI 12/2/2020)

WHERE’S THE OUTCRY?

An Islamic hate group massacred 25 farmers in the village of Tingwe, Congo. Some of the victims were found beheaded.  The attack occurred New Year’s Eve, December 31, 2020. 

There were over 10,000 people of color killed by Islamic hate groups in 2020  (Daily Kenn, 1/3/2021)         

Two children were burned alive and another decapitated when a minibus carrying about 20 passengers was attacked by an Islamic hate group in Mozambique.  Witnesses said a man was decapitated in front of his wife and children during the attack.  

Mozambique is a nation in Africa located east of Zimbabwe and Zambia. 

The attack occurred January 2, 2021.  In 2020 there were over 10,000 people of color killed by Islamic hate groups.  (Daily Kenn, 1/3/2021)

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GERMANY-RUSSIA PIPELINE

“We continue to call on Russia to cease using its energy resources for coercive purposes. Russia uses its energy export pipelines to create national and regional dependencies on Russian energy supplies, leveraging these dependencies to expand its political, economic, and military influence, weaken European security, and undermine U.S. national security and foreign policy interests. These pipelines also reduce European energy diversification, and hence weaken European energy security. — U.S. Department of State, “Protecting Europe’s Energy Security Act,” October 20, 2020. (Gatestone, 12/28/2020)

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COVID

New Covid strain ‘may resist vaccines’

Scientists in South Africa have warned that there is a “reasonable concern” that the country’s new Covid-19 variant might prove more resistant to the vaccines currently being rolled out in the UK.  Professor Shabir Madhi, who has led trials for the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, told the BBC the development makes the need for a global rollout of vaccines “even more critical.” (The Week, 1/5/2021)

How Israel is winning the vaccine race

As countries worldwide scramble to secure doses of the Pfizer and Oxford vaccines, Israel has taken a commanding lead in the race to protect its population from Covid-19.

More than a million Israelis have already been inoculated – a vaccination rate of 12.59 per 100 people, according to latest data from the University of Oxford. The Persian Gulf island nation of Bahrain is in second place with 3.57, with the UK in third on 1.39.  (The Week, 1/4/2021)

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IMPERIAL REDUX

“Among some contemporary Israelis, the British Mandate has come to be viewed nostalgically.  Although Palestine did not have the elephants, maharajahs and tigers of the Indian Raj, the same culture of Highland reels, polo and pink gins in the King David Hotel flourished.  So did an incorruptible civil service, possibly a novelty in the region.” (‘Blood and Rage,” by Michael Burleigh, 2009, page 89.)

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“Sir, my concern is not whether God is on our side; my greatest concern is to be on God’s side, for God is always right.”  (Abraham Lincoln)

“It takes a PhD in Economics not to be able to understand the obvious.”  (Kristol/ Crystal)

Mr. Blippi is a character on YouTube.   He’s quite famous, especially amongst children.   He entertains children while educating them and does a commendable job.    He’s made $40 million out of his venture.   You, too, can be rich if you dress like a dork and act like an idiot!  (Check him out.)

I looked up a small community in Michigan recently.  Under “Area attractions” the only place listed was the local Methodist church.  Sadly, they spelt Methodist wrong (Methoidist.)    The local bar is welcoming and friendly.   But you may want to give the “town” a miss.

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TO THE POINT

• England and Scotland back in lockdown – Boris Johnson has warned the coming weeks will be the “hardest yet” of the Covid-19 pandemic as he last night announced a third lockdown. The prime minister acted after modelling put the UK on course to exceed 100,000 Covid-related deaths before the end of the month without urgent action. People in all of England and most of Scotland must now stay at home except for a handful of permitted reasons.  (The Week, 1/5)

• Female drivers join Moscow Metro – Trains on Moscow’s Metro subway system can now be driven by women, after a decades-long ban on female drivers was overturned. The first of a new generation of female drivers started work on Monday after Russia’s Ministry of Labour ordered that women be allowed to drive trains on the network. A ban on hiring new female drivers was introduced in the early 1980s.  (The Week, 1/5/2021)

• South Korean birth rate sinks – There have been calls for action to revive South Korea’s falling fertility rate after the nation recorded more deaths than births in 2020. There were only 275,815 births, a record low, compared to 307,764 deaths, a 3.1% increase in fatalities compared to the previous year. This is the first time South Korea has reached the “population death cross”, the name given to the point at which the number of deaths surpasses births.   (The Week, 1/5/2021)

• Is Trump headed for Scotland?  Donald Trump could be planning to visit Scotland during Joe Biden’s inauguration ceremony. Sources at an airport in Prestwick, near the Trump-owned Turnberry golf resort, say a US military plane is scheduled to arrive on 19 January, and that the aircraft – a Boeing 757 – had been used by the US president on past trips. President-elect Biden is due to be sworn-in as America’s 46th president on 20 January.  (The Week, 1/5/2021)

• Watching Sky News on the coronavirus in the UK, it’s hard to believe that the last time we all lived through a universal pandemic, the UK was the greatest country in the world, ruling a third of the world’s population.   Not only did they get through it, they helped all their colonies get through it.   Additionally, they ruled all of them, making the day-to-day decisions that every country needs.   Now they are having difficulty just taking care of themselves!

BIDEN TO BETRAY BRITAIN

REJECTED, ISOLATED, CUT OFF AND PLAGUED BY THE VIRUS, BIDEN THRUSTS IN THE DAGGER

President-elect Joe Biden has dashed hopes of a post-Brexit trade deal between the UK and US when he succeeds Donald Trump in January. As he outlined his vision for his first few days in the White House, the former vice-president confirmed it does not involve a trade deal with Prime Minister Boris Johnson. Instead, Mr. Biden has said he will adopt a similar “America First” policy as US President Donald Trump, fighting “like hell” to invest in US firms and employees.  (Daily Express, 12/18/2020)

CHRISTMAS ABOLISHED IN UK

For the first time since 1643 England has basically banned Christmas.   Then, it was the Puritan influence that banned it because of the wild parties and sensuality that surrounded it.  The ban remained until the Restoration of the monarchy that followed Cromwell’s death, in 1660.  Now, it’s because of a new strain of the coronavirus, which is spreading alarmingly.   The government has told people they must stay in place, in their own homes, isolated from others.   Travel has ceased between the UK and many European countries as well as nations further away.  

On the website “Historic England” is the following:

“On 19 December 1643, an ordinance was passed encouraging subjects to treat the mid-winter period ‘with the more solemn humiliation because it may call to remembrance our sins, and the sins of our forefathers, who have turned this feast, pretending the memory of Christ, into an extreme forgetfulness of him, by giving liberty to carnal and sensual delights’. The rejection of Christmas as a joyful period was reiterated when a 1644 ordinance confirmed the abolition of the feasts of Christmas, Easter and Whitsun. From this point until the Restoration in 1660, Christmas was officially illegal. Although Cromwell himself did not initiate the banning of Christmas, his rise to power certainly resulted in the promotion of measures that severely curtailed such celebrations. Nevertheless, the Puritans’ prohibition of Christmas proved very unpopular, and pro-Christmas riots broke out.”  

Note especially the words” “Pretending the memory of Christ.”

THERE REALLY WAS A WAR ON CHRISTMAS, MR. PRESIDENT.  IT WAS WAGED BY CHRISTIANS.
The Washington Post, 23 Dec 2020, by Gillian Brockell 

It’s that time of year again. No, not Christmas. The War on Christmas. And the war on the claim that the War on Christmas even exists.

President Donald Trump invoked the alleged war yet again this week after signing an executive order giving federal employees the day off for Christmas Eve. “This is a HUGE victory in the Democrats’ pathetic WAR ON CHRISTMAS, and I want YOU to be a part of it,” Trump announced in a fundraising letter.

One 16th-century Anglican bishop complained that “men dishonor Christ more in the twelve days of Christmas than in all the 12 months besides,” Christmas misrule was largely tolerated.  After all, the birth of Jesus had been tacked onto pagan traditions that had existed for centuries. 

(https://www.stamfordadvocate.com/news/article/There-really-was-a-war-on-Christmas-Mr-15824044.php)

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Buckle up for the ugliest election Israel has ever known – analysis
Two big differences from the previous elections will set the tone for the rhetoric we are going to hear over the next few months. Jerusalem Post, 22 Dec 2020

The first difference is that Benjamin Netanyahu is facing for the first time two strong adversaries to his right.  While Benny Gantz put up a formidable fight over the last three elections, it was mostly from the Center-Left. He had very few right-wing voters, and it was fairly easy for Netanyahu to depict him as weak and as a “leftist,” messages that played well with his own Likud voter base.  This time, though, not only has Naftali Bennett built up a strong following – mostly due to his championing of small businesses during the coronavirus crisis – but there is now a party led by former longtime Likudnik Gideon Sa’ar that is looking more and more like a newer and cleaner version of Likud. 

According to polls, the two parties could bring in as many as 33 seats in a future Knesset, more than the Likud’s 28. Matched with partners from the Center, that could be enough to deny Netanyahu a return to the Prime Minister’s Office.

The second difference is Netanyahu’s trial, which is set to shift into high gear in February when the Jerusalem District Court begins to hear testimony in the three cases against the prime minister for bribery, fraud and breach of trust.  Netanyahu will likely try to use the election to get the court to delay proceedings. But if he fails and the court insists on starting, the public will see its prime minister in court on almost a daily basis, not exactly the images Netanyahu will want circulating just weeks before an election.  Because of this, Netanyahu will go as negative as possible. He will, of course, play up his success in bringing vaccines to Israel (he does deserve a lot of credit for that), and he will want those vaccines to be what people remember when they vote. More>>  https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/politics-and-diplomacy/buckle-up-for-the-ugliest-election-israel-has-ever-known-analysis-652926)

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Swedish king says nation has ‘failed’

Sweden’s king has added his voice to the growing chorus of criticism of the country’s Covid response, telling his people that “I think we have failed.”

Addressing the nation as part of an annual TV review of the year, King Carl XVI Gustaf said that the Swedish people had “suffered tremendously in difficult conditions.”  (The Week, 12/18/2020)

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CHINA “WINNER IN CORONA CRISIS”

German government advisors see China as the “winner in the Corona crisis” and call for a “strong and consolidated stance by the EU” in relationship to the People’s Republic. With “effective crisis management,” Beijing has enhanced its global economic and political influence, according to a recent analysis published by the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP). Having long been accustomed to dominating international politics, the West must now expect China to play a more “assertive” role, the SWP writes. The People’s Republic has, in fact, been successful in fighting the Covid-19 pandemic at home, thus laying the groundwork for the economic recovery that is now enhancing its clout vis à vis the EU and the USA. With its Covid-19 vaccine supply, it can now also strengthen its position in various Asian, African and Latin American countries, whose plight has widely been ignored by the like-wise pandemic-stricken Western powers. The new free-trade RCEP agreement is also perspectively helping to shift the center of gravity of the global economy toward Asia.   (German Foreign Policy, 12/18/2020)

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FRANCE UNDER ATTACK

“If nothing changes, in a few decades, France will have submitted to Islam, and Islamic violence will probably be even greater than today. It is already almost impossible for the country’s leaders to react. They are hostages of a Muslim population that is less and less integrated and whose anger they do not want to arouse. They are under the gaze of groups that immediately denounce any criticism of Islam and under pressure from many countries in the Muslim world that France does not want to offend.” — Alan Wagner, “L’Europe face à l’islam,” interview on Tepa, August 2, 2020

“For Muslims, Islamic law has God as its author. Any other legislator is illegitimate.” — Mohammed Hocine Benkheira, historian, Le Point, March 21, 2016 

“France still does not understand the reality it is facing. It believes that it has been struck by terrorists . . . but it is suffering a guerrilla war that is gradually gaining momentum . . .” — Algerian writer Boualem Sansal, lexpress.fr, October 18, 2020.

(“France is still under attack,” Guy Milliere, Gatestone, 12/6/2020)

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HUNGARIAN BORDERS TO REMAIN INTACT

“Hungary will only be a Hungarian country as long as its borders remain intact. Therefore, not only our thousand-year-old statehood but also the future of our children obliges us to protect our borders.” — Judit Varga, Hungarian Justice Minister, December 17, 2020.   (“Hungary:  “Europe’s borders must be protected,” Soeren Kern, 12/18/2020)

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This is a deeply religious message that not all Christians would agree with. I have included it in this blog because it has been neglected by the media. Religious sentiment is not something they would understand. It does help you understand the mind of the outgoing president.

Trump thanks God for sending Jesus to ‘redeem the world’ 
‘At Christmas, we give thanks to God and that God sent his only Son to die for us  and to offer everlasting peace to all humanity’
16 Dec 2020, Lifesite

At a time when some politicians would deem it politically incorrect to say “Merry Christmas” in public and would certainly not dare to speak about Jesus in the public square, Trump not only boldly wished Americans a “very, very Merry Christmas,” he went on to speak about the true meaning of Christmas in eloquent words that many Christians would be hard-pressed to hear from the pulpit.   Here’s what Trump said:

“To every family across our nation, the First Lady and I want to wish you all a very, very Merry Christmas.

“For Christians, this is a joyous time to remember God’s greatest gift to the world. More than two thousand years ago, the angel Gabriel appeared to Mary. He said, ‘Do not be afraid, you have found favor with God.’ The angel told her that she would give birth to a baby boy, Jesus, who would be called the Son of the Most High. Nine months later, Christ was born in the town of Bethlehem. The Son of God came into the world in a humble stable.

“As Christians everywhere know, the birth of our Lord and Savior changed history forever. At Christmas, we give thanks to God and that God sent his only Son to die for us and to offer everlasting peace to all humanity. More than two millennia after the birth of Jesus Christ, his teachings continue to inspire and uplift billions and billions of people all over the globe. His Divine word still fills our hearts with hope and faith. And, Christians everywhere still strive to live by Jesus’ timeless commandment to his disciples, ‘Love one another.’

“Above all, during the sacred season, our souls are full of thanks and praise for Almighty God for sending us Christ His Son to redeem the world.

“Tonight, we ask that God will continue to bless this nation. And we pray that He will grant every American family a Christmas season full of joy, hope, and peace.

“On behalf of Melania and the entire Trump family, Merry Christmas to all and best wishes for a very, very great and happy new year. Thank you.”

For some reason, Trump’s message is not available at the White House and can only be found with difficulty using Google’s search engine.

(https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/trump-thanks-god-for-sending-jesus-to-redeem-the-world-in-powerful-christmas-message-thats-gone-viral)

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TO THE POINT

• A cartoon in our local paper showed a man visiting his public library asking for something by Charles Dickens.  He was directed to “Current Events.” 
• Three hundred and seventy years ago, between 1645 and 1660, Parliamentarians completely outlawed Christmas. The Government imposed a festive vacuum each December which was underpinned by the Puritan belief that the Catholic celebration was a sinful extravagance fueled by immorality.   (Dec 19, 2019)
• Matthew Syed, reviewing the British papers on Sky News on Saturday evening made an interesting comment.  He said that in the western world we each compare ourselves to other western countries; that the number of people in a million who have died of Covid-19 is basically the same in the UK, Germany, France and the US; but we should take a look at Eastern nations like Taiwan, South Korea and Vietnam, where the numbers are a lot lower.   Taiwan has only lost seven people.   Why?
• UK INFLATION SINCE 1950:  The pound had an average inflation rate of 5.19% per year between 1950 and today, producing a cumulative price increase of 3,349.22%. This means that today’s prices are 34.49 times higher than average prices since 1950, according to the Office for National Statistics composite price index. (Dec 12, 2020)
• “Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech.”  — Benjamin Franklin
• “Whites are at the back of the queue when it comes to vaccinations”  — official policy.
• “In announcing the $900 billion stimulus bill to deal with the pandemic, Speaker Nancy Pelosi did not mention that the gifts for her distressed countrymen and women at Christmas would have been twice as large had she taken President Trump’s offer of $1.8 trillion in October . . .   Rather than let Donald Trump take credit, Pelosi stiffed millions of Americans.”  (Pat Buchanan, 12/22/2020)
• Speaking of the stimulus package, this is just a portion of the “pork” . . .

• A year ago, President Donald J. Trump declared he would name Mexican Cartels as foreign terrorist organizations. He paused his decision, and then tabled it, based on assurances from Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and a reported wave of resistance from his own cabinet.   The incoming Biden administration has the cartels virtually “high-fiving” each other — they know a Biden administration will do nothing to stop cartel dominance and control of the US-Mexico border.  (“Drug Trafficking,” Chris Farrell, Gatestone, 12/23/2020 .

There will be no blog next week. My next blog will be posted on January 7th

US V CHINA: WHO’S WINNING?

(Photo credit: (The Sunday Guardian Live)

Anyone with a pulse and a smartphone probably knows by now that the US-China rivalry is heating up these days, and fast.  (If you know anyone who doesn’t, get them a Signal subscription.)

Let’s recap the latest drama between the world’s two largest economies.  In tech, after squeezing Huawei over 5G, US President Donald Trump now wants to ban TikTok and WeChat. Harsh words — backed up by sanctions — are still flying over China’s crackdown on Hong Kong and its repression of the Uighurs.   The US has also waded into the South China Sea dispute, closed China’s consulate in Houston, and stirred up a hornet’s nest by dispatching the highest-ranking official to visit Taiwan in more than 40 years.

Why is this all happening?   Because each side, in its own mind, is winning.

Trump’s big swipes at China are good electoral politics:   Americans’ distrust of China is at an all-time high, and one of the (very) few things that Democrats and Republicans agree on these days.  What’s more, Democrats can’t really push back on Trump’s China approach now that the US intelligence community has said it believes Beijing prefers a Biden victory in November.

For Beijing, the US undermining Chinese tech companies and slapping sanctions on Chinese officials over “internal” matters feeds President Xi Jinping’s nationalist narrative that Washington is preventing China from taking its rightful place as a rising global power.   It also explains why Beijing wants to break the (US-dominated) internet, and assert its dominance over all territories where China’s rule is contested — including Taiwan.

However, there’s one area they seem unlikely to mess with for now.  Phase I of the US-China trade deal signed in January was hardly a big win for either side, but enough to pause a rapidly escalating trade war that was hurting both US and Chinese businesses (and consumers).  (Signal, 8/11/2020)

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NOT SO UNITED KINGDOM

Post-Brexit, United Kingdom is not so united
,  Six months after Britain broke away from the European Union, Prime Minister Boris Johnson is trying to stop the breakaway of restive parts of the U.K.
  On Friday, Mr. Johnson sent his popular Treasury chief, Rishi Sunak, to Scotland, to tamp down nationalist sentiment.  There, Mr. Sunak noted that Scottish firms would get 2 billion pounds ($2.6 billion) in loans to survive the lockdown.  Another top minister, Michael Gove, visited Northern Ireland with nearly $500 million in aid to help frustrated companies deal with new checks on shipped goods.  Experts have long predicted that Brexit would strengthen the forces pulling apart the U.K.   But in Scotland, in particular, the pandemic has accelerated those forces.  In an average of recent polls, 52.5 percent of people said they would vote for Scottish independence — a swing from the 2014 referendum, when 55.3 percent of Scots voted to stay in the U.K.   What it means:   This is the first time the polls have consistently shown a majority for breaking away, one polling expert said.  Pro-independence feelings have hardened in Scotland during the pandemic because many people there believe that Scotland has done a better job managing the crisis than neighboring England has.  Case study:   The implications of leaving the bloc are dawning on some of those in Mersham, an area close to Britain’s busiest port where support for Brexit was strong.   A 27-acre parking lot is being built to handle trucks amid fears that new trade rules will slow freight movement.  (New York Times, 10 Aug 2020)

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ZIMBABWE’S CONTINUING ECONOMIC CHAOS

Forgive Zimbabweans for not celebrating “Heroes’ Day” today.  The annual commemoration of those who died fighting against white rule comes at a time of great suffering.  The value of the local currency has plummeted against the American dollar.   Inflation is running at more than 700%.   The World Food Programme reckons that 60% of Zimbabweans will soon struggle to get enough to eat. The ruling party, Zanu-PF, blames covid-19.   The truth is that it has run the country into the ground.   After toppling Robert Mugabe in a coup in late 2017, Emmerson Mnangagwa and his backers in the military have behaved much as he did, manipulating the currency and responding to unrest with repression.   In recent weeks journalists and opposition figures have been arrested and allegedly tortured.   But as the economy spirals out of control, how long can Mr. Mnangagwa hold on?   The veteran of the independence wars may see himself as a hero. Zimbabweans disagree.   (The Economist,  8/10/2020)

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Banks braced as pandemic poses biggest test since financial crisis | Provisions for loan losses are at the highest in a decade as lenders prepare for large-scale company bankruptcies             
(© Financial Times UK, 10 Aug 2020)                                                                    by Stephen Morris and Owen Walker in London and Laura Noonan in Dublin

During the depths of the coronavirus crisis in Europe in late March, Sergio Ermotti remembers sitting in his home study in Lugano, reflecting on the latest financial meltdown to engulf his career as a banker.  “If I go through my last eight years, we had a lot of mini-earthquakes, but never of the magnitude of what we are seeing now,” the 60-year-old UBS chief executive says.  “This is a crisis that is driven by fear in a different way . . . this time it’s not just about people losing their assets or savings, it’s about their life, it’s about their families.  It’s so profound, so different.”   Switzerland’s largest bank is weathering the crisis relatively well, considering its share price is down only 10 per cent this year, a more modest fall than any other global lender apart from Wall Street’s Morgan Stanley.

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 BARR ON URBAN GUERILLA WARFARE

• Attorney General William Barr revealed that the United States is under attack, facing a new form of “urban guerilla warfare.”
• Barr on Fox News’ “Life, Liberty & Levin” on Sunday said that the left’s “lust for power” was the driving force behind this new anti-American assault.
• He added that the media’s false characterization of the “Black Lives Matter” organization as a fed-up activist group was misleading the American people and leaving them vulnerable to what is actually a group of “Bolsheviks” focused on taking over the country and turning it into a communist run country.
• Barr tore into the media for selling a “lie” to the American people in their horrifically biased coverage of the civil unrest caused by these two dangerous groups. (Lifeandlibertynews)

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FROM FRANCE:

• “We only love what hates us, anything that destroys us is seen as great.  There is a desire to destroy truth, history . . .  We no longer teach the history of France and we no longer say what our civilization has accomplished.   We only talk about our civilization to disparage it.” — Michel Onfray, Le Salon Beige, July 30, 2020 and YouTube, July 17, 2020.
• “France is undergoing reverse colonization.   Populations coming mainly from countries formerly colonized by France have settled in France without any intention of integrating.  Most of them live in neighborhoods where the laws of Islam now reign and where imams spread hatred of France . . .   And in a gesture of submission, the French authorities say that hatred does not emanate from those who kill, but from those who want to react and say that we must put an end to assaults and murders. It is a suicidal attitude.”   — Éric Zemmour, YouTube, November 22, 2016   (Guy Milliere, Gatestone, 8/9)

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THE NEED FOR A MUTUAL DEFENSE TREATY FOR ISRAEL

“Although the relationship between Israel and the United States has many of the characteristics of a formal alliance – intelligence sharing, regular joint exercises, prepositioned weapons and so forth – the two countries have opted not to sign a traditional mutual defense pact because of Israel’s determination to defend itself by itself and maintain freedom of action in conducting military operations, and because of American reluctance to be dragged into Middle East conflicts.”

However, according to Makovsky, the revival of Iran’s nuclear program and the growing capabilities of its proxies mean Israeli deterrence alone may be insufficient to stave off a regional military conflagration, particularly given “the trend in America towards a retrenchment in the Middle East.”   Hezbollah’s arsenal of an estimated 130,000 rockets and missiles is vastly superior quantitatively and qualitatively to its stockpile the last time it fought an all-out war with Israel in 2006.  “Unless there’s a regime collapse in Iran, I think we’re heading at some point to a major war between Israel and Iran and Hezbollah.”   (Gary C. Gambill, Middle East Forum, 8/10/2020)

Iran Has 125 Outposts and Bases in Syria – Dean Shmuel Elmas (Israel Hayom) —  Iran has 125 outposts of its Revolutionary Guards Corps and pro-Iranian militias in Syria, the Turkish research institute Jusoor has revealed.

The Iranians have set up 37 military locations in the Deraa governorate in southwestern Syria, not far from Israel.

There are another 22 Iranian outposts in and around Damascus, 15 in Aleppo, and another 5 each in the Quneitra and al-Suwayda governorates in southwestern Syria.

***

Fatah, PLO Are Planning a Third Intifada – Nan Jacques Zilberdik (Palestinian Media Watch)  —  “A popular uprising that will result in a comprehensive intifada” is being planned by Fatah, the PLO, and other Palestinian groups, according to a statement they issued on July 28.  Asked by the PA TV host if this would be a “peaceful” and “non-violent intifada,” PLO Executive Committee member Wasel Abu Yusuf answered in the negative.

Former Israeli Defense Minister:  Hizbullah Responsible for Beirut Blast – Neta Bar (Israel Hayom) —  A Hizbullah weapons depot that caught fire led to the explosion of the ammonium nitrate stored in Beirut port, former Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon told the Saudi outlet Elaph on Friday.

Pro-ISIS Media Center Urges Muslim In The West To Set Forests, Factories, Agricultural Fields, And Buildings On Fire  (MEMRI, August 2020)

Friday Sermon In Bojnurd, Iran By Abolghasem Yaghoubi:   Pork Contains A Microbe That Weakens One’s Zeal; Just Look At The Westerners – There Is No Difference Between Men And Women There  (MEMRI 8/9/2020)

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EMPIRE REDUX

Rhodesia had contributed, per head of population, more in both world wars than any part of the British Empire, including the United Kingdom itself.   (“The Rhodesia Syndrome,” Tiberiu Dianu, December 11, 2016)

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TO THE POINT

• FAILING DEMOCRACIES – Both Lebanon and Belarus claim to be democracies.  The former is very corrupt, as evidenced last week by the massive blast that hit Beirut.  Belarus, the last dictatorship in Europe, had an election at the weekend.  Their president Alexander Lukashenko was returned with 80% of the vote after 26 years in office.   That stretches credulity too far.
• We’ve just finished watching the new Perry Mason on HBO.   Any resemblance to the old TV series with Raymond Burr is largely coincidental, but not entirely.   The new Perry Mason shows how the “crew” came together:   Perry and Della Street (now a lesbian), Drake (now black), thanks to PC and the intervening 60 years!  There is some nudity in the new series but there is a lot of swearing.  I don’t remember any of either in the earlier 271 episodes.   All eight episodes are just one story, but a very good one with lots of twists.
• A promising TV series called “Wild Bill” is being shown on TV.   I’m curious.  The series is based around a US police chief who is sent to Lincolnshire, on the east coast of England, where I come from.  Why the English force would need the help of a US cop is beyond me!  (The show is being streamed on Britbox.)
• The Epoch Times contains some really good movie reviews by Tiffany Brannan, of movies that are quite old.   These words appeared at the end of last week’s article.  “Tiffany Brannan is an 18-year-old opera singer, Hollywood historian, travel writer, film blogger, vintage fashion expert, and ballet writer.  In 2016, she and her sister founded the Pure Entertainment Preservation Society, an organization dedicated to reforming the arts by reinstating the Motion Picture Production Code.”
• Australians too divided for sustained conflict – Former PM Tony Abbott has raised concerns about Australia’s deteriorating strategic situation saying the nation’s economy is not as strong as it should be nor its citizens as united as they need to be. (Politicom 8/10/2020)
• Qatari Press:   Reconversion Of Hagia Sophia Into Mosque Is A Historic Step; We Hope To See Prayers At Great Mosque Of Cordoba (Spain)  (MEMRI, 8/8/2020)
• Britain in recession as PM warns of ‘bumpy months –
  Boris Johnson has said the British economy faces “bumpy months” ahead and has a “long, long way to go” until it sees a return to “economic vitality and health”.   GDP figures announced this morning confirmed that the UK has officially fallen into recession for the first time since the 2008 financial crash.   The Office for National Statistics has announced earlier this week that about 730,000 jobs have been lost since March.
• Biden names Kamala Harris as running mate — Senator Kamala Harris, the former presidential candidate, has been picked by Joe Biden to be his running mate, making her the first black woman and Asian-American to be selected as vice-presidential nominee. Writing on Twitter, Harris said she was “honored” to join Biden on the Democratic ticket and pledged to “do what it takes to make him our Commander-in-Chief.”   Biden will face President Donald Trump in the election on 3 November.  (The Week, 8/12/2020)
• The Economist Is Sick — Our local library lets me read  The Economist before anyone else.   Now, in the midst of the virus, there’s a delay of a week as the magazine has to go through quarantine.  If I had my own subscription (about $200) I could read it right away.   Not only that, but I have to pick up my magazine  in the parking lot, without getting out of my car.   I have to have the trunk open so library staff can put it in there without any contact with me.

 

 

 

 

 

WORST DEPRESSION SINCE 1706

(The Spectator, April 11, 2020)

Bank of England warns of sharpest annual contraction since 1706    For the year as a whole, the economy is expected to contract by 14%. 

This would be the biggest annual decline on record, according to Office for National Statistics (ONS) data dating back to 1949.   It would also be the sharpest annual contraction since 1706, according to reconstructed Bank of England data stretching back to the 18th Century.    By Szu Ping Chan, Business reporter, BBC News, 7 May, 2020    (https://www.bbc.com/news/business-52566030 (5/7)

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 Factories in US Close for Good as Coronavirus Cuts Demand    Some manufacturers that furloughed employees during lockdowns say plants won’t reopen

Factory furloughs across the U.S. are becoming permanent closings, a sign of the heavy damage the coronavirus pandemic and shutdowns are exerting on the industrial economy.   (Wall Street Journal, 5/11/2020)

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U.S. levels of hunger and unemployment are soaring
Nearly one in five young children in the U.S. are going hungry. 

That’s according to a new survey of households by the Brookings Institution, which found that 17.4 percent of children were not eating enough.   The level is three times as high as in 2008, during the Great Recession.

Disruptions in school meal programs during the pandemic may be part of the problem, the lead researcher said, with some families unable to reach distribution sites and older siblings at home competing for limited food.   As hunger rises, Democrats in Washington are seeking to raise food stamp benefits for the duration of the economic crisis, but Republicans have balked at a long-term expansion of the program.

April’s labor report, due Friday, is expected to show that U.S. payrolls fell by 22 million, according to economists surveyed by MarketWatch.   The worst monthly loss on record was nearly two million jobs in September 1945. (NY Times, 7 May 2020)

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Covid-19 is our punishment, but we need to work with doctors to fight the pandemic, says Zulu king
9 May 2020, by Zimasa Matiwane,  TimesLive

Zulu King Zwelithini also believes Africa had strayed from God and earned his wrath and if the people of Africa “went back to God, I am certain he will protect us.”   “We must admit that we angered Jehovah, that is why he is punishing us, he is humbling us.   This tells me God wants us as a nation, he wants his time with us as a nation. It’s a time where God wanted us to prepare, in connecting with him, not just to meet at churches, he wanted a one-on-one with us,” the monarch explained. King Goodwill Zwelithini addressed his subjects via Zoom on Saturday about Covid-19.

(https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/south-africa/2020-05-09-covid-19-is-our-punishment-but-we-need-to-work-with-doctors-to-fight-the-pandemic-says-zulu-king/)

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PROTEST AGAINST BORDER CLOSURE

Over the weekend, hundreds of French and Luxembourgian citizens have protested the ongoing closure of German borders.   On March 16, the German government unilaterally reinstated strict border controls.   Since then, German police have prevented more than 100,000 citizens of several neighboring countries from entering Germany.   Berlin’s measures have been causing considerable hardships also for French and Luxembourgian citizens, working in German factories and hospitals.   They are also being regularly exposed to harassment by German border police and to a resurgence of old anti-French chauvinism in Germany.   French commuters are increasingly being treated as “second-class EU citizens,” notes a French senator.

The former EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker had warned that “Germany will cause permanent damage with the way it is treating some of its neighbors.” 

Germany’s crisis policy is also provoking protests in Southern and Eastern Europe.   (German Foreign Policy, 5/11)

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MEMORIES OF WORLD WAR II

Union Jacks lowered, replaced with swastikas.   This was the British government’s worst nightmare in the early years of the second world war.   And in June 1940 it became reality in the Channel Islands, the only British territory to come under Nazi control.   Today they celebrate their 75th annual “Liberation Day” since the German surrender.   The islands just off France’s northern coast endured almost five years of Nazi rule; food shortages inspired Guernsey’s famous “potato-peel pie.”   With a media blackout in place, local journalists set up an underground news service.  Jersey’s residents daubed swastikas on the houses of anyone considered too cosy with the invaders.   But the islands were not exactly a hotbed of anti-Nazi resistance.   Just two local politicians spoke out against anti-Semitic orders.   Jews were registered and their businesses liquidated.   Most were deported.   Three died in Auschwitz.   Indeed the islands’ experience weakens post-war claims that Britain would have resisted Nazi occupation more strongly than other European states. (The Economist, 5/9/2020)

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MODERN FRANCE

A few months ago, a police officer, Noam Anouar, who infiltrated Islamist circles . . . stated that no-go zones in France are now foreign enclaves on French territory.   “The gangs operating there,” he wrote, “have formed a parallel economy based on drug trafficking. They consider themselves at war with France and with Western civilization.   They act in cooperation with Islamist organizations, and define acts of predation and rampage as raids against infidels.”   He noted that reclaiming these areas today would be complicated, costly, and involve calling in the army.

For years, successive French governments have chosen a policy of “willful blindness”:   they simply behave as if they do not see what is going on.   They do not even try to find solutions.   (Guy Milliere, Gatestone, 5/10/2020)

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72 Knesset Members back Netanyahu to form next government
Once approved by Rivlin, Likud leader has two weeks to form a government; move comes hours after Knesset passes amendment to Basic Law that allows for Netanyahu and Gantz to share premiership as part of recently signed coalition deal
(Associated Press, 7 May 2020, Ynet)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu formally received the support of a majority of lawmakers to lead a new government on Thursday, paving the way for a controversial power-sharing deal with rival-turned-partner Benny Gantz.   Likud and Blue & White said that “representatives of the two parties submitted to President Reuven Rivlin the 72 signatures of Knesset members recommending Benjamin Netanyahu for the task of assembling an emergency national unity government.”

Once approved by Rivlin, Netanyahu will have two weeks to form a government.   Of the 72 MKs who supported Netanyahu, 36 were members of Likud, 16 came from Blue & White, two were from Derech Eretz party, two from Labor, nine from Shas and seven from United Torah Judaism.   Lawmakers from Naftali Bennett’s Yamina party did not add their support to back Netanyahu and was unclear whether they would join the new government, which is set to be sworn in on Wednesday of next week.
(https://www.ynetnews.com/article/ry57ljWq8)

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CBS CHEATS

During a pandemic, the media can play an invaluable role in providing accurate reporting so that people may take action based on the best available information.

Scare tactics not only gravely undermine that sacred duty but give credence to the dangerously wrong belief that the coronavirus (COVID-19) presents no real threat.

For a second time, that lesson appears lost on CBS News.  Weeks ago, the network aired footage of a chaotic scene at an Italian hospital while alleging the video came from New York City.

Project Veritas has now learned that a CBS News crew filming in Grand Rapids, Michigan wasn’t satisfied with the orderly COVID-19 testing scene at Cherry Medical Center in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Getting their desired footage involved taking medical professionals away from their duties and getting them in cars to give the illusion that the line of patients was longer.   (Townhall)

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GREATEST DANGER TO CATHOLIC CHURCH

Life Site News reported on May 4:   “Dr. Robert Moynihan, the editor-in-chief of the Catholic journal Inside the Vatican, revealed on April 23 that he once had a conversation with then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (who later became Pope Benedict XVI) about the ‘greatest danger to the Church,’ and he recounts that Ratzinger said:   ‘It is Freemasonry . . . Bishop Schneider states that Freemasons were crucial in the promotion of abortion, same-sex ‘marriage,’ and euthanasia in France . . .

“Then-Cardinal Ratzinger was already in the 1980s so concerned about the nature and work of Freemasonry that he worked out a statement for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, whose Prefect he then was, which repeated the Church’s long-standing ban on Freemasonry.   That is to say, he re-stated that Catholics may not be members of Freemasonry.   On November 26, 1983, Ratzinger signed a document that stated, ‘Therefore the Church’s negative judgment in regard to Masonic association remains unchanged since their principles have always been considered irreconcilable with the doctrine of the Church and therefore membership in them remains forbidden.   The faithful who enroll in Masonic associations are in a state of grave sin and may not receive Holy Communion.’”

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POST-CORONA CHURCHES

Stephen Bullivant, whose book Mass Exodus studied Catholic attrition in Britain and America, offers three reasons why he believes churches will shrink after the pandemic.

First, he says, churchgoers (both lay and clergy) tend to be elderly and therefore more likely to die of coronavirus.   Second, many churches rely on a steady influx of immigrants.   With the world in lockdown, that supply has, at least temporarily, dried up.   Third, churchgoing is a habit, and once that habit is broken, it is hard to take it up again.  (“Risen Again,” Luke Coppen, The Spectator (UK), 4/11/2020)

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TO THE POINT

• Deadly attacks on funeral and hospital in Afghanistan — A suicide bomber has attacked the funeral of a police commander in Afghanistan, killing at least 24 people and injuring 68. In a separate attack, gunmen disguised as police stormed a hospital in the Afghan capital Kabul, killing 16 people, including two newborn babies, at a maternity clinic run by the humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders.  (The Week, 5/18/2020)
• The Trump administration ordered that an American federal pension fund, the Thrift Savings Plan, with around $600bn under management, stop investing in all Chinese companies.  The White House says they pose national-security threats and might become subject to sanctions.   There is a growing clamor among Republicans to devise punitive measures against China, which they accuse of covering-up facts about covid-19.   (The Economist, 5/13/2020)
• The number of confirmed cases of covid-19 surged past 4m globally, with more than 282,000 deaths.   America, with a third of the world’s fatalities, is by far the worst-hit country.   Yet even governments that appeared to have tamed the disease warned of its re-emergence.   South Korea reported 35 new cases on Monday—its biggest increase in a month.   A new cluster of infections in Shulan, in north-eastern China, forced the city into complete lockdown.   And Germany’s infection rate accelerated. (The Economist, 5/11/2020)
• Boris Johnson, Britain’s prime minister, announced plans to relax England’s lockdown, encouraging people who cannot work from home to return to their jobs and permitting more outdoor activities from Wednesday.   Shops and some schools may reopen in June.   Mr. Johnson’s new “stay alert” slogan was criticized by some for being confusing.   Harsher restrictions will remain in Scotland and Wales. (The Economist, 5/11/2020)
• “The American media is using the virus crisis in order to attack Trump, but the Greek people will not tolerate such craven opportunism and dishonesty.   Criticism of the government is almost non-existent, as the suddenly wise populace is united against the unseen menace.”  (Taki, The Spectator, 4/11/2020).

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AFTERTHOUGHT

As if the coronavirus isn’t bad enough, debt could be the determining factor as regards the future of the US in particular and the West in general.

I got to thinking about this during the week when Nancy Pelosi proposed giving every household in the US $6,000.   That’s a total of $3 trillion.   To be added to a national debt of $23.3.   What’s an extra $3 trillion between friends?

Isn’t anybody frightened of debt anymore?  I know I avoid it like the plague (the coronavirus!).

Romans 13:8 tells us to “Owe no one anything.”

If you are in debt, you are not in the best position to weather whatever storms may come your way as a result of the virus (unemployment, reduced hours and wages, rising food prices, to name just three).

Why did you get into debt in the first place?

Let’s be honest here – greed is normally the answer.   We want.   We want things we can’t afford, but we believe the ads that tell us “you owe it to yourself.”

Or we want a bigger home (why?), or a second car (why?) or new furniture (again, why?).

Matthew 6:31-33:   So don’t worry about these things, saying, “What will we eat?  What will we drink?  What will we wear?”  These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs.  Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need.

Stay out of debt.   If you’re in debt, get out of it ASAP.   You will be able to cope with the new reality, the “new normal,” a lot better if you’re not in debt.

MR     

THE DEATH OF FREEDOM

A person does a cartwheel in Oxford Circus during rush hour as the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues, London, Britain, March 23, 2020. REUTERS/Dylan Martinez

We have less freedom today than we have had in over 400 years.   And we’ve all consented to this loss of freedom.

Freedom of assembly and the freedom to worship have both suffered.  Even the freedom to go out for a meal or a drink.    Nor can we shake a friend’s hand or give a hug.   Again, with our consent.

As one British paper put it:  “It is no exaggeration to say these are the most extreme powers ever used against citizens in peace time Britain.”

It’s understandable.  We want to live.  We want to survive the coronavirus.

But will we ever get these freedoms back?

Most importantly, what will be the next crisis that makes us so quick to jettison our freedoms?

MR       

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“A heart attack is occurring in the economy”  (Sky News comment, 3/20)

This was a comment about the British economy, but it describes every country right now.   So, let’s take a look at some of the economic consequences of coronavirus.

Argentina’s new government will today publish GDP figures for last year, with economists warning that the covid-19 pandemic could be about to send the country into a deep recession.   GDP is forecast to have contracted by 2.1% in 2019.   But what matters now is the dire situation to come.   One former central banker predicts that the country’s economy could shrink by up to 4% in 2020.   Though weighed down by high inflation and heavy debt, President Alberto Fernández’s government is implementing fiscal stimulus measures worth billions of dollars.   Its treasury minister, Martín Guzmán,  warns that the covid-19 crisis means that it is now impossible to say when, and how, Argentina can return to growth.   That was Mr. Fernández’s primary goal when he took office just four months ago, an aim that looks harder by the day as infections mount in the country.     (The Economist, 3/25/2020)

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For years Germany has run the tightest of fiscal ships, frustrating many in the euro zone and beyond.   Then came covid-19.   Today the Bundestag will approve a €156bn ($168bn) supplementary budget for 2020, under which Germany will issue new debt for the first time since 2013.   The borrowing breaks Germany’s “black zero” balanced-budget policy and exploits an emergency rule in the constitutional “debt brake.”   Yet it is just one part of Germany’s response.   The government has expanded Kurzarbeit support (in which the state partly covers the lost wages of workers who have their hours cut), extended various loan guarantees and even earmarked funds for direct investment in companies.   The package amounts to a potential €750bn, and more may follow.   The scale of the response has surprised observers—but at European level less is happening.   Germany, and the euro area’s other hawks, remain implacably opposed to debt mutualization.   (The Economist, 3/25/2020)

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Today’s meeting of the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee should have been the first with Andrew Bailey in the chair.   But the new governor found himself presiding over an emergency meeting last week, amid what he described as “borderline disorderly” market conditions.   In common with other central banks, the Bank of England is aggressively easing monetary policy to react to a rapid economic slowdown due to the spread of covid-19.   Despite interest-rate cuts, £200bn ($232bn) more quantitative easing (amounting to some 10% of GDP) and more direct support for private-sector lending, the bank is more worried about undershooting its inflation target than overshooting it. Today’s consumer-price statistics show inflation running at 1.7%, below the 2% target.   More monetary easing is likely, but with interest rates already at 0.1%, an all-time low, fiscal policy will have to do most of the heavy lifting.  (The Economist, 3/25/2020)

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Coronavirus lockdown measures implemented in the UK may trigger an economic downturn that could kill more people than the virus itself, a new study warns.

Philip Thomas, a professor of risk management at Bristol University, says that a fall in GDP of more than 6.4% could lead to a devastating recession in which “more years of life will be lost . . . than will be saved through beating the virus,” reports The Times.  (The Week, 3/25/2020)

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The worst outbreak of Coronavirus in the Middle East, so far, is in Iran.  Thousands have died and tens of thousands have been exposed to the virus.   An overlooked developing crisis parallel to Iran’s is the situation of the country’s neighbors across the Persian Gulf.

Beyond the civilian element affecting Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE; tens of thousands of American military personnel are also stationed in these countries.   Once facing the Iranian threat and ISIS, they are now involved in combating the invisible enemy:   Covid-19.      (Greg Roman, MEF, 3/20)

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This is an emergency, track everyone:   If there were ever a time to set concerns about privacy aside, this is it.   Giving public health authorities access to everyone’s location data gives them a better chance of tracking down people who have been in contact with confirmed cases – and helps ensure that those who are already sick stay in quarantine.   Right now, governments need all the help they can get.   Give them the data.   Debates about the privacy implications can wait.

China is in this camp. So are other countries in Asia, like South Korea and Taiwan, that have had better success containing the epidemic – although it’s still too early to say whether access to mobile phone location data was the deciding factor.   (Gzero, 3/25/2020)

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A SURPRISING LETTER FROM HOLLYWOOD

Dear Mr. President, @realDonaldTrump

I wanted to thank you for ur recent decorum, sincerity, & care towards us.   You’re taking charge & leading in a manner needed & wanted for this country.   I highly commend you for ur boundless energy & willingness to solve problems.   Thank you!

— Kirstie Alley (@kirstiealley) March 24, 2020

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TO THE POINT

• LAGOS — A jihadist group ambushed and killed around 70 Nigerian government troops in Borno state, in the north-east of the country.   The guerrillas used rocket-propelled grenades to attack a vehicle full of soldiers; they also took several captive.  The group they belong to split off from Nigeria’s homegrown Boko Haram in 2016, and now considers itself an Islamic State affiliate. (The Economist, 3/25/2020)
• BERLIN – A court in eastern Germany convicted eight far-right extremists who were accused of planning to violently overthrow the state.   The regional court in Dresden on Tuesday convicted one of the men on a charge of forming a “terrorist organization” and the other seven of being members of the group, called Revolution Chemnitz.   Five of the man were also found guilty of a serious breach, while one was convicted of bodily harm.  The court sentenced the defendants to prison terms that ranged from 27 months to 5 ½ years.  (Lansing State Journal, 3/25/2020)
• UNITED NATIONS — UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged leaders of the world’s 20 major industrialized nations on Tuesday to adopt a “wartime” plan including a stimulus package “in the trillions of dollars” for businesses, workers and households in developing countries trying to tackle the coronavirus pandemic.   He said in a letter to the Group of 20 leaders that they account for 85% of the world’s gross domestic product and have “a direct interest and critical role to play in helping developing countries cope with the crisis.”  (Lansing State Journal, 3/25/2020)
• LONDON – Prince Charles has coronavirus.  Prince Charles, 71, is displaying mild symptoms “but otherwise remains in good health,” a spokesman said, adding that the Duchess of Cornwall, 72, has been tested but does not have the virus.   Charles and Camilla are now self-isolating at Balmoral.   Buckingham Palace said the Queen last saw her son, the heir to the throne, on 12 March, but was “in good health.”   The palace added that the Duke of Edinburgh was not present at that meeting, and that the Queen was now “following all the appropriate advice with regard to her welfare.”
  A Clarence House statement read:   “In accordance with government and medical advice, the prince and the duchess are now self-isolating at home in Scotland.  “The tests were carried out by the NHS in Aberdeenshire, where they met the criteria required for testing.  “It is not possible to ascertain from whom the prince caught the virus owing to the high number of engagements he carried out in his public role during recent weeks.”
• Germany is the only country in Europe to have currently rejected China’s offer of support in combating the Covid-19 pandemic. According to China’s President Xi Jinping, he informed Chancellor Angela Merkel that the People’s Republic of China “is willing to provide help within our capabilities,” if Germany “is in need.”   Over the past few days, Beijing has sent aid supplies and – in some cases – teams of doctors to provide practical on-site assistance to several European countries including Italy, Spain and France.   Berlin has ignored the offer of support, even though there is, for example, a glaring shortage of respiratory protection masks in Germany.   More than 80 percent of Germany’s registered doctors are complaining that they cannot procure sufficient protective clothing.   Serious accusations for failing to take preventive measures are being raised against the German government, which has been emphasizing that it is “well prepared.”   Leading German media are denouncing China’s aid as a “propaganda campaign” and accuse the country of being “the cause of the pandemic.”  The only thing missing is the use of Trump’s label of a “Chinese virus.” (German Foreign Policy, 3/24/2020)
• A growing number of businesses and individuals worldwide have stopped using banknotes in fear that physical currency, handled by tens of thousands of people over their useful life, could be a vector for the spreading coronavirus.   Public officials and health experts have said that the risk of transferring the virus person-to-person through the use of banknotes is small.   But that has not stopped businesses in the US from refusing to accept currency and some countries from urging their citizens to stop using banknotes altogether.   (Times of Israel, 3/20/2020)

 

US-EU RIFT GETS WORSE

Hello everybody,

The election dominates US news.   There are many conflicting reports.

In Michigan, polls show Trump losing to every prominent Democratic candidate.   Yet, at the same time, his rallies (and those for VP Mike Pence) attract audiences too big to be accommodated.

And note the following report from the Munich Security Conference (read article “Munich Security Conference,” further down).  “Europeans widely expect Trump to be re-elected this fall.”

Meanwhile, the Democratic debate held last night in South Carolina, shows the party tearing itself apart.   Amy Klobuchar said it best:   “If we continue to tear each other apart over the next four months, we will see Trump continue to tear the country apart for the next four years.”  Another House Democrat described the seven Democrats on stage as a “circular firing squad.”   They should remember the words of Jesus Christ in Matthew 12:25 — “A house divided against itself cannot stand,” words quoted by Abraham Lincoln on the eve of the Civil War.  With Trump so universally “hated,” it’s incredible the Democrats can’t come up with a winning candidate!

The second issue that dominates the news is the coronavirus.  Hopefully, this will not have the death toll of the various plagues that hit the world during the Middle Ages.   Justinian’s “flea” (probably bubonic plague) killed a manageable 5,000 a day in the first month; then 10,000 a day.   The population was greatly diminished.   As with the coronavirus, it was spread through trade and international travel.   It was the same in the 14^th century, 800 years later, when the plague hit Europe again.  The death toll was a staggering 50% of the people.  Just over a century ago, the Spanish flu infected 500 million people worldwide, about one third of the world’s population.   It killed an estimated 20-50 million, including some 675,000 Americans.

We will get through it, but it may kill millions before it’s over.

One final thought on the election:   At least two of the candidates for the Democratic party claim to be Christians.   Voters, however, should be careful here.   All seven of the people appearing last night support a woman’s right to murder her baby!  (To be fair, so do some Republicans.)

Have a great week.

Melvin   

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Very early this morning, I came across a show on PBS World called “Gzero World”, with Ian Bremmer. Today they were reporting from the Munich Security Conference on world security issues.  The first four items come from their website.

US-EU RIFT GETS WORSE

The risk of a major technology blow-up between the US and Europe is growing.   A few weeks ago, we wrote about how the European Union wanted to boost its “technological sovereignty” by tightening its oversight of Big Tech and promoting its own alternatives to big US and Chinese firms in areas like cloud computing and artificial intelligence.

Last week, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and her top digital officials unveiled their first concrete proposals for regulating AI, and pledged to invest billions of euros to turn Europe into a data superpower.    (Gzero World, 2/25/2020)

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Communal violence in Delhi:   Over the past few days, India’s capital city has seen its deadliest communal violence in decades.  This week’s surge in mob violence began as a standoff between protesters against a new citizenship law that critics say discriminates against India’s Muslims and the law’s Hindu nationalist defenders.   Clashes between Hindu and Muslim mobs in majority-Muslim neighborhoods in northeast Delhi have killed at least 11 people, both Muslim and Hindu, since Sunday.   We’re watching to see how Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government responds – Delhi’s police force reports to federal, rather than local, officials.(Gzero World, 2/25/2020)

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Unlikely jihadist bedfellows:   For years, the jihadists of al-Qaeda and the Islamic State have been at odds over territory and ideology. Bloody clashes between offshoots of the two groups have become commonplace in Yemen and Syria, further destabilizing those war-torn countries.   But now, strangely, ISIS and al-Qaeda linked groups appear to have joined forces in West Africa, recruiting locals and divvying up vast swathes of territory in the Sahel – a semi-arid area stretching across the southern edge of the Sahara Desert.  Motivated by mutual practical interests and common foes – Western forces and local governments – they’ve set aside their doctrinal differences and are gaining ground in states with weak central governments like Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, the US military recently said.  This all comes as the Trump administration is weighing a sizable drawdown of US troops in West Africa.  (Gzero World, 2/25/2020)

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US-China tit-for-tat retaliations:   The Trump administration is weighing up retribution against Chinese journalists and state-owned media – as well as Chinese intelligence agencies – after Beijing expelled three Wall Street Journal reporters last week over an opinion column that criticized Beijing’s handling of the coronavirus.  The Chinese Foreign Ministry, incensed by the “China is the Real Sick Man of Asia” headline, demanded an apology from the Journal before booting three of its reporters, none of whom had anything to do with the column.   If the US responds in kind, it could lead to a cycle of tit-for-tat retribution and animosity between Washington and Beijing just as a preliminary trade agreement appears to have eased mounting tensions between the world’s two largest economies.   We’re watching to see if the Trump administration follows through on its threat – or if it’s just bluster.  (Gzero World, 2/25/2020)

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MUNICH SECURITY CONFERENCE

The annual gathering of the Munich Security Conference provides a useful barometer for the health of the transatlantic relationship. Two years ago, Europeans were reeling from the first year of the Trump administration.   Last year, they were resigned to that reality and determined to press ahead.  This past weekend, everyone was searching for a savior to address critical challenges amid a lack of global leadership.

Europeans widely expect Trump to be re-elected this fall.   After their shock at his 2016 victory, they seem to be bracing for the worst, but remain unprepared for the consequences.   They inquired about Democratic presidential candidates, asking what Bernie Sanders would mean for Europe and whether Michael Bloomberg was a good compromise for moderates.  (Amanda Sloat, Brookings, 2/18/2020)

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TRUMP EMBRACED BY ENTHUSIASTIC INDIANS

“It was the Trumpiest of offers.

“A rally at one of the world’s largest stadiums.   A crowd of millions cheering him on.   A love fest during an election year.”   (Lansing State Journal, 2/24/2020).

The stadium is the world’s biggest cricket stadium.  I wonder if President Trump was aware that cricket was the preferred sport of fellow Republican, Abraham Lincoln?

An incredible welcome from the world’s second most populous nation.  President Trump is hoping for a trade deal with India.

Sadly, it coincided with massive demonstrations against a new Indian immigration bill, which discriminates against Muslims.  At least twenty people have been killed.

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ISRAEL NOW RECOGNIZED BY 161 COUNTRIES

161 countries now have diplomatic relations with Israel, which is the highest number that it has ever been for the Jewish state.  Increasingly, the community of nations cares less about Palestinian objections and more about what Israel has to offer.   (Israel National News, 2/24/2020)

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NEVER ENDING SYRIAN CONFLICT

At a four-way summit with the leaders of Russia, Turkey and France, Angela Merkel will seek to influence the future of the northern Syrian province Idlib.  The summit, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan announced on the weekend is to be held next week.  It will explore options for ending the fighting in the province, where, over the past few weeks, Syrian troops have been advancing on militias.  Usually referred to as “rebels” in the German media, they are, in fact, dominated by an al Qaeda subsidiary.  The combat has deepened dissention between Russia and Turkey on how to go forward in Syria, raising new hopes among western powers for driving a wedge between Ankara and Moscow.   Prior to the summit, however, specialists are pointing out that Berlin hardly has any options for exerting influence in Syria.  The EU sees the overthrow of the government in Damascus as the precondition for granting desperately needed reconstruction aid.    (German Foreign Policy, 2/25/2020)

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MACRON VOWS CRACKDOWN ON POLITICAL ISLAM

“The problem is when, in the name of a religion, some people want to separate themselves from the Republic and therefore not respect its laws.” — French President Emmanuel Macron, February 18, 2020.   (Soeren Kern, Gatestone, 2/21/2020)

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SWEDISH MIGRANT CRISIS

“For the first time now, more crimes – in absolute terms – are committed by persons of foreign background than by persons of Swedish origin . . .   The most crime-prone population subgroup are people born [in Sweden] to two foreign-born parents.” — Report by Det Goda Samhället (“The Good Society”), summer of 2019. (Judith Bergman, Gatestone, 2/26)

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UK GROOMING GANGS TO REMAIN A SECRET

DAILYKENN.com — It’s a state secret.  No one is to know the ethnicity of grooming gang members.  The thugs are responsible for trafficking nearly 19,000 British girls in one year.

Who are these people?  No one knows because  Boris Johnson’s government won’t release statistics that reveal their ethnicity.

The truth is, of course, that the government doesn’t need to release the data because everyone knows the preponderance of the gang members are from non-white Islamic regions of the world.  Nearly all are ethnic Pakistanis.

It’s akin to the n-word.  No one dares say it, but everyone knows what it means.   Authorities said that releasing the data would not be in the public interest.

Survivors accused ministers of making “empty promises,” while a man who prosecuted abusers in Rochdale called for the Home Office to “show some courage and publish” its findings.

It comes after The Independent revealed that almost 19,000 suspected child sexual exploitation victims were identified by local authorities in just one year, sparking renewed calls for prevention efforts.   (Daily Kenn, 2/25/2020)

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GAY CONVERSION THERAPY BANNED IN MORE COUNTRIES

Global momentum is growing to ban so-called gay “conversion therapy,” with bills drawn up in nine countries, a rights group said on Wednesday.

The United States, Canada, Chile, Mexico and Germany are among countries seeking to outlaw the treatment, which includes practices from electric shocks to “praying away the gay” and is based on the belief that being gay or transgender is a mental illness that can be “cured,” Ilga, an LGBT+ advocacy group, said.

Worldwide, only Brazil, Ecuador and Malta have national bans on conversion therapy, condemned as ineffective and harmful to mental health by more than 60 associations of doctors, psychologists or counsellors globally, the Ilga study said.

“The main driving force [for reform] is survivors with their testimonies coming forwards,” Lucas Ramon Mendos, author of the Ilga report, which said 2020 could be a turning point in the fight against “therapies” that have ruined many lives.

“A lot of awareness is being created through their testimony,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.   (Rachel Savage, Independent, 2/26/2020)

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TO THE POINT

• A headline in our local newspaper, the Lansing State Journal, appeared Monday.   It read: ‘White supremacy seeps into public, experts warn.”   It added:   “Incidents show startling jump over the past year.”   The article went on to show that violence emanating from “white supremacist groups” is increasing and is expected to grow further in the years ahead.   There is no excuse for violence.  But surely this is a reaction to the massive immigration of recent years and the constant emphasis on multiculturalism.   Until both change, there will be a constant threat from the political “right.”  It’s a reaction to the “extreme left.”
• There’s a plan in Michigan to expand the options offered on payday loans.  These “short term, high cost financial products,” have trapped millions of families into a never ending “costly and potentially catastrophic cycle of debt.”  (David Snodgrass,  Lansing State Journal, 2/20/2020).   The bill “would allow lenders to charge a monthly service fee of 11% on the principal of a loan, equivalent to an APR of around 132%.   In practical terms, this means a borrower would end up paying more than $7,000 to pay off a $2,500 two-year loan.”   Heed the following biblical advice:  “If any of your fellow Israelites become poor and are unable to support themselves among you, help them as you would a foreigner and stranger, so they can continue to live among you.  Do not take interest or any profit from them, but fear your God, so that they may continue to live among you.” (Lev. 25:35-36)
• I went to a concert on Monday evening.   The Academy of St Martin in the Fields played Brahms Symphony Number 4, along with a violin concerto by Paganini and a short piece by Mozart.  It was a delightful and relaxing evening with good friends.
• Also relaxing (and gripping) is my latest “read:”   “The Race to save the Romanovs” by Helen Rappaport was published in 2018.  After the Russian revolution in 1917 the Romanov family were under house arrest.   When the communists came to power later in the year, their situation deteriorated fast.   Many people wanted to save them and their five young children, but no attempt got very far; eventually, they were all brutally murdered.   The Bolsheviks were, if nothing else, thorough – killing all their opponents for over seventy years!   The deaths of the children were particularly reprehensible.   Today’s Russians have tried to make amends by canonizing each member of the Imperial Family.  28% of Russians polled said they would like to see the monarchy restored.   But how do you restore it when you killed everybody off?    (Interestingly, 28% is roughly the support US presidents get; when you consider that only 54.9% bothered to vote in the last election.)    Maurice Paleologue was the French Ambassador to Russia at the time of the revolution.   He said the only man who could have saved them was Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany.   The Russians had been fighting the Germans, along with the British and the French.  The Kaiser helped Lenin get to Russia and, when he assumed power, entered into a peace deal with him, so that Russia could leave the war.    The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk of 1918 could have (should have) included a clause freeing the Czar and his family.   Wilhelm was related to the Russian Imperial Family.  He particularly loved the children.   Why didn’t he save them?

CALL MOSCOW, NOT WASHINGTON

Bijan Djir-Sarai, FDP foreign policy parliamentarian

The German government can no longer implement important foreign policy projects in the Arab world without Russia’s support, as the results of Saturday’s negotiations between Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin demonstrate.  Moscow will, in principle, support the “Berlin Process,” with which the German government would like to take on the role of an influential mediator in the Libyan war.   Without Moscow, Berlin did not succeed in holding the International Libya Conference, which was designed to become the first highlight in the “Berlin Process.”   In the run-up to Merkel’s Moscow visit, German foreign policy experts lavished unhabitual praise on the influence Russia has gained over the past few years.   If you wanted to achieve anything in Syria, “you had to call Washington;” according to Bijan Djir-Sarai, FDP foreign policy parliamentarian, “today you have to call Moscow.”   Alexander Graf Lambsdorff, member of the Bundestag (FDP) calls German/Russian relations “a treasure.” (German Foreign Policy, 1/15)

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Mayor’s resignation highlights threat to German leaders
Arnd Focke, the Social Democratic mayor of a town in Lower Saxony, was regularly threatened by nationalists.  Now he has resigned.  Regional officials have repeatedly faced threats across Germany.

The mainstreaming of nationalist politics, most visible in the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, has become a means of spreading ideas once considered taboo, Focke said.   But, he said, it would be too simple to blame the AfD for the threat to centrist regional German politicians.   “The problem is right at the heart of our society,” Focke said.   “We no longer stand up for each other or against extremism.   People are able once again to say things they weren’t even allowed to think five years ago.”   “We failed to educate,” Focke said.   “Children and young people must be taught that we in Germany have a past that cannot be allowed to repeat itself.   And there are many people who are discontented and are too easily manipulated to this end.”    Focke is now trusting federal investigators to look into the swastikas and the threatening notes. He believes that other politicians have also resigned because of threats — they just don’t say so publicly.  (Deutsche Welle , 12 Jan 2020)

(https://www.dw.com/en/mayors-resignation-highlights-threat-to-german-leaders/a-51974296)

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PEOPLE TRAFFICKING

Illegal immigration throughout Europe continues unabated.  In France, for instance, nearly 20,000 migrants have been arrested so far in 2019, according to the police website France Bleu, which also reported that 189 people smugglers have been arrested since January 1.

In Britain, The Telegraph newspaper reported that Albanian people smugglers were posting advertisements on social media platforms, including Facebook, promoting their ability to get people into Europe.   The ads are accompanied by TripAdvisor-style feedback comments from “satisfied” customers…. people smuggling gangs generate profits of up to £6 billion (€7 billion; $8 billion) a year…

“Europe under siege from people-smuggling gangs,” Soeren Kern, Gatestone, 1/7)

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SUEZ CANAL ALTERED ECOLOGY

Experts say Mediterranean Sea altered by Suez Canal’s invasive species.  Red Sea invaders have driven native marine life toward extinction and changed the delicate ecosystem with potentially devastating consequences, marine biologists warn                                         by Aron Heller and Isabel Debre (16 Jan 2020, Times of Israel)

AP — As Egypt marks the 150th anniversary of the opening of the Suez Canal, marine biologists are bemoaning one of the famed waterway’s lesser known legacies — the invasion of hundreds of non-native species, including toxic jellyfish and aggressive lionfish.

The canal, which connects the Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea, revolutionized maritime travel by creating a direct shipping route between the East and the West.   But over the years, the invasive species have driven native marine life toward extinction and altered the delicate Mediterranean ecosystem with potentially devastating consequences, scientists say.

The influx has increased significantly since Egypt doubled its capacity in 2015 with the opening of the “The New Suez Canal,” raising alarm in Europe and sparking criticism from various countries along the Mediterranean basin.  The sharpest criticism comes from neighboring Israel, which once battled Egypt in war alongside the 193-kilometer (120-mile)-long canal.

(https://www.timesofisrael.com/experts-say-mediterranean-sea-altered-by-suez-canals-invasive-species/)

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LIBYAN INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE

Libya pledge:  Russia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and other foreign powers have promised to end all interference in the armed conflict in Libya, as part of a German-brokered effort to halt rising violence and chaos in the north African country and prepare the ground for a UN-sponsored peace process.  The promise was contained in a document agreed by world leaders at a conference in Berlin yesterday.  However, there were already signs of fresh military escalation in the civil war-wracked state. (FT 1/20)

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ALPINE AUSTERITY:   As the World Economic Forum prepares to kick off its 50th annual meeting in the Swiss ski resort of Davos on Tuesday, the Financial Times reports on the elite gathering’s efforts to appear more environmentally-friendly.  Among other things, it is encouraging participants to take trains instead of private jets, and is providing shoe grips to cajole attendees to “walk the snowy promenade between meetings rather than take cars.”

The effort to be sustainable extends to advising caterers not to serve luxuries such as foie gras and caviar, and one day of the meeting has been set aside for “vegetarian menus and the discovery of alternative protein sources.”   This year’s events — including the launch of an initiative to plant 1 trillion trees in the next decade — will take place in rooms decorated with seaweed-based paint and carpets made from “end-of life fishing nets.”   The scores of companies hosting their own events have been asked to consider offering local wines and “mountain herbal infusions” instead of imported drinks.

(Brussels Briefing, Financial Times, 1/20/2020)

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RELIGIOUS TENSIONS IN INDIA

Whether it is France or Nigeria, Italy or Myanmar, the presence of militant Muslims is a serious cause of concern to all — most of all to Muslims who want freedom from Islamists, be they inspired by Iran, Saudi Arabia or Pakistan.

If one were to watch India through the lens of its social media and the statements made by its upper middle-class urban elites of the Left, the country is facing chaos and is in a downward spiral towards a catastrophe.

At the centre of this storm in a teacup is a new law passed by both houses of the Indian Parliament that provides for a fast track towards citizenship for refugees in India who fled religious persecution in three of India’s neighbors — Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh before 2015 and who now live in difficult conditions as stateless persons.

Since most of the people who fled India’s three Islamic neighbors were non-Muslim, the new Indian law known as the Citizenship Amendment Act is applicable to Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists and Zoroastrians.   (Tarek Fatah, Toronto Sun, MEF, 1/20/2020)

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IRANIAN WOMEN DEFY MULLAHS — WHY DON’T WESTERN FEMINISTS SUPPORT THEM?

Before 1979, Iranian women had freedom.   They want it back.

If Iranian feminists who refuse to wear the hijab are brave, their Western counterparts, who wear pink hats, have wretchedly abandoned them.   Why is Iranian barbarism so easily condoned in the West?

Thirty years ago, the Berlin Wall was torn down by ordinary citizens who wanted to reclaim their freedom of movement.  Today, the wall of the Iranian regime could be torn down by these ordinary women who want to reclaim the freedom to wear what they like.  They are bravely refusing to walk on flags of Israel and the U.S. — and enjoying the wind in their hair again.   (Giulio Meotti, Gatestone, 1/19/2020)

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TO THE POINT·

• Yemeni Journalist Ahmed Al-Musaibily:   Israel Is Our Number One Enemy But At Least It Does Not Try To Convert Muslims To Judaism The Same Way That Iran Converts Sunnis To Shi’a Islam (MEMRI 1/20) – Iraqi security forces reportedly killed two protesters in Baghdad. Demonstrators, frustrated at the slow pace of the government’s reforms, are demanding new elections, an independent prime minister and prosecution of corrupt officials.   Security forces responded with live rounds and tear-gas.   The UN envoy in the country called for protests to remain peaceful and for politicians to address people’s concerns. (Economist, 1/22)
• EUROPE’S NIGERIAN MAFIA — Italian intelligence has named the Nigerian mafia “the most structured and dynamic” of any foreign crime entity operating in Italy, according to the Washington Post….   What distinguishes the Nigerian crime networks is their severe brutality.   Black Axe has also spread to Canada, where a 2015 report by the  Globe and Mail described it as a “death cult”… linked to “decades of  murders and rapes….        In the US, the FBI recently linked a series of financial frauds to        Black Axe.                                                                                                              (Judith Bergman, Gatestone, 1/8/2020)
• FRENCH ANTI-SEMITISM — “In France, perpetrators of anti-Semitic attacks claim insanity to elude justice.   The mental illness defense has become more prevalent when it comes to hate crimes in France.   And it seems to be working.” — Shirli Sitbon, Haaretz.
• Muslim anti-Semitism has long been ignored in France.
• “The situation is not under control.” — Celine Pina, Le Figaro.    (Guy Milliere, Gatestone, 1/22)

• PIERS MORGAN:  “Spare me your ‘patriotic’ crocodile tears, Harry – you DIDN’T have to quit.   You chose to ditch the Queen, the monarchy, your military comrades and your country… to become a royal Kardashian and keep Meghan happy. ” (Daily Mail, 1/20/2020)

CITY DECLARES NAZI EMERGENCY

The anti-immigration AfD party won 28 percent votes in the regional elections in September [File: Wolfgang Rattay/Reuters]

A city in eastern Germany has declared a “Nazi emergency,” saying it has a serious problem with the far-right.

Dresden, the capital of Saxony, has long been viewed as a bastion of the far-right and is the birthplace of the anti-Islam Pegida movement.

Councillors in the city – a contender for the 2025 European Capital of Culture – have now approved a resolution saying more needs to be done to tackle the issue.

But opponents say it goes too far.

What is a ‘Nazi emergency’?

“‘Nazinotstand’ means – similar to the climate emergency – that we have a serious problem.  The open democratic society is threatened,” local councillor Max Aschenbach, who tabled the motion, told the BBC.

Mr. Aschenbach, from left-leaning satirical political party Die Partei, said he believed it was necessary to take action because politicians were not doing enough to “position themselves clearly” against the far-right.   (BBC News 11/2)

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OUTRAGE AS AFD OBJECTS TO MIXED RACE CHILD

The mayor of Nuremberg in Germany has attacked a far-right party for “openly racist” comments about a teenage girl picked to be a Christmas gift-bringer.

A member of Alternative for Germany (AfD) attacked Benigna Munsi, who will open the city’s Christmas market.   The teen was born in Nuremberg to an Indian father and a German mother.  “You would laugh about it if you didn’t know these guys are serious, but you could cry about this level of hostility,” Mayor Ulrich Maly said.

He said there had been “idiotic comments” about previous children chosen for the traditional role of “Christkind” (Christ Child), but this attack had an “openly racist connotation.”

A now-deleted Facebook post by an AfD district branch said that German people were being eradicated like Native Americans.

“Nuremberg has a new Christ Child.   One day, we’re going to go the way of the Indians,” it read.   Another AfD member meanwhile provoked further criticism for writing online that the teenager’s “foreign” nose was a “slap in the face to friends of tradition.”   (BBC, 11/4)

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MEXICAN CARTEL KILLS 9 AMERICANS

“Breaking news coming out of Mexico detailed the horrific cartel killings of an American family, which, astonishingly, The New York Times tried to pin on (get ready for it) fundamentalist religion. Specifically, the Mormon faith.

An American family living in Mexico was ambushed and massacred by a cartel, with three women and six children murdered.   The scene as described by surviving family members is horrific:

“They described a terrifying scene in which one child was gunned down while running away, while others were trapped inside a burning car.   Two of the children killed were less than a year old, the family members said.   The car they were in with their mother was set ablaze.”

In one article, the family is described as being part of a “fundamentalist Mormon community,” while in another the spotlight is on the victims’ faith.

In fact, a quick Google search of the NY Times coverage of the tragedy yielded the following headlines on articles put up at various times during the day by the Times:

“9 Members of Mormon Family in Mexico Are Killed in Ambush,”      “A Storied Mormon Family Reels After Mexico Murders,”              “What We Know About the Killing of 9 Mormon Family”    and        “US Victims in Mexico Attack From Mormon Offshoot Community.”

In between these headlines, another mainstream media source, NBC, chimed in with its own coverage:   “Slain U.S. citizens were part of Mormon offshoot with sordid history,” which detailed, well, the “sordid history” of the group which they called a “cult.”   (Clarion 11/6)

COMMENT ON TWITTER — “Thanks @nytimes.   For a second there, I thought it was the murderous cartel’s fault that six children were burned alive while their mothers were raped, then shot rather than Mormonism.   Silly me.” (https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/1191822530727829506)

Six children were murdered and this is how The New York Times chooses to cover it.  Pathetic.

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NON-MEXICAN ILLEGALS INCREASING IN NUMBER

Border Patrol agents in San Diego arrested a historic number of non-Mexican migrants crossing illegally into the U.S. during the 2019 fiscal year.

“San Diego sector realized its highest number of apprehensions from countries other than Mexico in the history of tracking statistics for this population with a total of 27,255 arrests,” said Kathleen Scudder, acting deputy chief patrol agent for the San Diego sector.

To put that number in perspective, Border Patrol agents arrested 11,509 non-Mexicans during the 2018 fiscal year.   Between 2009 and 2015, the average number of non-Mexican border apprehensions were 1,500, records show.

The majority of non-Mexican nationals apprehended came from Central American countries like Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador, she added.    (San DiegoTribune)

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HOW MALAYSIAN AIRLINES 370 DISAPPEARED

“They didn’t follow protocol.  They didn’t follow procedure.   More could have been done.   As a result of the inaction of the air force – of all of the parties involved in the first hour who didn’t follow protocol – we are stuck like this now.   Every one of them breached protocol one time, multiple times.   Every single person who had some form of responsibility at the time did not do what he was supposed to do.   To varying degrees of severity.   Maybe in isolation some might not seem so bad, but when you look at it as a whole, every one of them contributed 100 percent to the fact that the airplane has not been found.”

“And every one of them was a government employee.”   (“Vanished:   how Malaysia airlines flight 370 disappeared,” William Langewiesche, The Atlantic, July 2019)

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SOUTH AFRICAN VICTORY OVER ENGLAND IN RUGBY WORLD CUP

The Rugby World Cup victory by the Springboks on Saturday is inevitably being seen as a moment of national reconciliation, with people focusing on what it means for a black South African captain to hold aloft a trophy after leading a team that was once a potent symbol of apartheid.

For some, it is a holiday from the problems that plague us.   Still, the events of the weekend have also exposed how some benefit from fanning divisions in society.   For them, the sight of a team of people from different parts of our society beating the best in the world as a united team is bad news.   And so they have to do everything they can to distract us and kill the moment.

The victory by the national rugby team on Saturday could not have been scripted better.   Led by Siya Kolisi, a man from an incredibly poor background, a team involving players from most of our communities was able to comprehensively take apart a team many considered to be better than them.   The scrums showed what happens when everyone pushes together.   The moment when Makazole Mapimpi scored South Africa’s first try in a World Cup Final was full of genius and symbolism.   As was Cheslin Kolbe’s logic-defying try just a few minutes later.   (By Stephen Grootes, Daily Maverick, 11/4)

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SOUTH AFRICAN WATER CRISIS

As the Eastern Cape treasury last week made R120m available in drought relief for the province, several towns were running out of drinking water as more dams dried up and the province’s total remaining water dropped to 50% of capacity.

On Saturday a strict warning was sent to residents in eight towns in the Eastern Cape – Aliwal North, Mount Fletcher, Lady Grey, Ugie, Barkley East, Burgersdorp and Maclear – not to drink the water supplied by the municipality without boiling it first.

In an official notice, the municipal manager for the Joe Gqabi Municipality, Zolile Williams, added that residents must add a teaspoon of bleach to every 25 litres of drinking water to make it safe.

“We can no longer guarantee the quality of the drinking water supplied by the municipality,” the notice reads.   (Estelle Ellis, Daily Maverick, 11/4)

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IRAN ANNOUNCES FRESH VIOLATIONS OF NUCLEAR DEAL WITH EXTRA, ADVANCED CENTRIFUGES                                       Tehran’s nuclear chief says domestically made centrifuge in development is 50 times faster than those allowed under 2015 accord

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran on Monday broke further away from its collapsing 2015 nuclear deal with world powers by announcing it’s doubling the number of advanced centrifuges it operates, calling the decision a direct result of President Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the agreement.

The announcement — which also included Iran saying it now has a prototype centrifuge that works 50 times faster than those allowed under the deal — came as demonstrators across the country marked the 40th anniversary of the 1979 US Embassy takeover that started a 444-day hostage crisis.

By starting up these advanced centrifuges, Iran further cuts into the one year that experts estimate Tehran would need to have enough material for building a nuclear weapon — if it chose to pursue one. Iran long has insisted its program is for peaceful purposes, though Western fears about its work led to the 2015 agreement that saw Tehran limit its enrichment of uranium in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions.   (The Times of Israel, 11/4)

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WHY SO MANY ARE DEMONSTRATING                                                Blame economics, demography, a sense of powerlessness . . . and social media

For anyone trying to follow protest movements around the world it is hard to keep up.   Large anti-government demonstrations, some peaceful and some not, have taken place in recent weeks in places on every continent:   Algeria, Bolivia, Britain, Catalonia, Chile, Ecuador, France, Guinea, Haiti, Honduras, Hong Kong, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Lebanon and more.    On November 1st Pakistan joined the ever-lengthening roll as tens of thousands of protesters converged on the capital, Islamabad, to demand that the prime minister, Imran Khan, stand down within 48 hours.

Probably not since the wave of “people power” movements swept Asian and east European countries in the late 1980s and early 1990s has the world experienced such a simultaneous outpouring of popular anger on the streets.   Before that, only the global unrest of the late 1960s bears comparison in terms of the number of countries swept up and the number of people mobilized.   (Economist, 11/4)

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IMPACT OF GAY PRESIDENT IN MIDEAST

In an October 7, 2019 article on the website of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party, Egyptian journalist and Muslim Brotherhood (MB) member Amer Shamakh wrote about the growing support for the LGBTQ community and same-sex marriage in the West, and in the U.S. in particular.   Calling them “perversion” that is contrary to human nature and the monotheistic religions, he warned that if potential Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg became president, this would lead to a campaign of pressure on Arab countries to accept the LGBTQ community as normal, as it is perceived today in the West.   Expressing concern that Arab leaders would capitulate to such pressure, he underlined that Islam views homosexuality as “one of the most loathsome deeds,” that “Islamic law instructs that those who carry it out be killed by burning, being thrown from a high place, or stoning,” and that the Prophet Muhammad himself even ordered that this be done.   (MEMRI, 1/5)

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TO THE POINT

• We are not witnessing a legitimate impeachment process, and certainly not any form of justice recognizable in America since the Massachusetts Spring of 1693.   (Chris Farrell, Gatestone, 11/5)
• The Deutsche Bank is supporting the imminent IPO (initial public offering) of the world’s largest oil company Saudi Aramco thus helping to consolidate power in the hands of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.   On Sunday, the competent Saudi authorities gave the green light for the IPO, which will be executed in the first half of December and will flush double-digit billions into the Public Investment Fund (PIF), Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund.   The PIF will play a central role in financing strategic domestic investments and buying strategic shares in foreign companies and will de facto be controlled by the Crown Prince personally.   Experts agree that bin Salman is directly responsible for the murder of the Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi in Riyadh’s consulate in Istanbul.   Already years ago, the Deutsche Bank had financed deliveries of arms to Saudi Arabia, which were used in the war on Yemen.   Along with other German companies, the bank participated in last week’s investor conference in Riyadh.  (German Foreign Policy, 11/5)
• Iran and its terror proxy Hezbollah are financing Mexican drug cartels, smuggling people into America and recruiting them (for pay) as sleeper jihadist cells.   The recruits are mainly immigrants to Mexico from the Middle East, mostly from Lebanon where Hezbollah is based.   The coordinated operation is part of Iran’s war on America.   (Clarion Project, 11/5)
• “As widespread protests plunge Lebanon into political crisis mode once again, we are reminded that multi-ethnic democracies in the Middle East aren’t exactly a model of good governance.   Those looking for solutions to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict should take note, and this should give pause to advocates of the one-state solution.”   (The Delusional One-State solution, MEF, 11/4).
• There are reports on the Gatestone website (11/3) that Turkey is sending arms to Boko Haram, the terrorist group that operates in Nigeria and other west African nations.   The terror group targets Christians.   Observers have wondered how Boko Haram obtains sophisticated weapons.   The Turkish connection answers the question.