Joel B. Pollak - Page 284

In an echo of protests this week in Baltimore, demonstrators in Jerusalem, Israel have taken to the streets to oppose police brutality against Ethiopian Israelis. The immediate trigger for the protest, which drew hundreds of people to the streets near Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s residence, was a surveillance video showing two policemen beating a black Israeli soldier in uniform. Jerusalem mayor Nir Barkat rushed to the scene to listen to the demonstrators’ concerns.

As the Supreme Court takes up oral arguments on whether there is a fundamental right to gay marriage, Californians will be watching closely.

Numerous reports, based on second-hand accounts, have alleged that former President George W. Bush “bashed” President Barack Obama in his remarks at the gala dinner of the Republican Jewish Coalition spring leadership meeting in Las Vegas on Saturday. Bloomberg View bases its report on notes provided by an attendee; so does the New York Times–although, to his credit, the Times’ Jason Horowitz actually sought other quotes from exiting attendees as he stalked outside the event.

Stanford University president John Hennessy is condemning the vandalism of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity house at the university, which was daubed with swastikas that were discovered on Sunday morning, the Stanford Review reports.

LAS VEGAS –The Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) wrapped up its spring meeting in this weekend on an enthusiastic note. Several presidential contenders, declared and potential, addressed the meeting in on-the-record sessions. Former President George W. Bush addressed the gala dinner Saturday, in a rare (and off the record) public appearance.

Journalists are supposed to ask tough questions. On Sunday morning’s edition of ABC News’ This Week, however, host George Stephanopoulos pursued Clinton Cash author (and Breitbart News editor) Peter Schweizer with a vehemence that suggested he had reverted to his 1990s incarnation as a spokesman for the Clinton administration. Stephanopoulos looked past the Clintons’ glaring conflicts of interest and focused narrowly on whether the book met a criminal standard of proof.

Federal law enforcement and homeland security officials are reportedly stepping up security due to an ISIS-related terror threat, according to CNN. The boosted security was reportedly prompted by “intercepted chatter and other intelligence information” that suggested parts of the state could be in danger.

This weekend, leaders of the Republican Jewish Coalition hold their annual spring meeting in Las Vegas–and, as in prior years, many Republican presidential hopefuls will be in attendance. The conference is hosted by Sheldon Adelson, casino magnate, philanthropist and Republican mega-donor.

With Hillary Clinton reeling from a major ethics scandal, true-blue Democrats are looking for alternatives to their party’s presumptive presidential nominee. The bench is rather weak. There’s Martin O’Malley, the former Maryland governor who couldn’t build an Obamacare exchange and provoked a Republican sweep. There’s Elizabeth Warren, the fake Indian and genuine real estate speculator who has learned to parrot the “progressive” talking points. And then there’s Jerry Brown.

On Friday, the lead editorial in the Wall Street Journal–often a mainstream conservative bellwether–castigated Hillary Clinton for the conflicts of interest exposed by Breitbart editor Peter Schweizer’s forthcoming book, Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich. And, in a moment of rare bipartisan unity, the lead editorial of the New York Times–a liberal mouthpiece–largely agreed.

In the run-up to the Iraq War in 2003, New York Times columnist began to reconsider his support for the military option, as he became convinced that the Bush administration was going to mishandle the war and its aftermath. Fast-forward 12 years, and Friedman is making similar moves ahead of the final talks on a nuclear deal with Iran. In his Apr. 23 column, Friedman says that while a nuclear deal is desirable, the structure and context of the deal means “it will not be easy.”

The revelation that four left-wing MSNBC hosts have failed to pay their taxes (Al Sharpton, plus Melissa Harris-Perry, Joy-Add Reid, and Touré Nesbitt) recalls an episode in 2011, when Andrew Breitbart raised the issue of MSNBC’s tax-dodging.

TechCrunch’s Kat Zakrzewski has an odd argument against Republican bills to curb the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) recent decision to impose Net Neutrality: we don’t really need transparency, after all. Zakrzewski’s stance shows how far Silicon Valley’s “progressive” activists have come after years of pushing for the maximum transparency possible in public affairs. When the feds are doing what they want, the public is better off in the dark.

Sharyl Atkisson of the Daily Signal reports that Covered California deliberately tried to hide its operations from public scrutiny, including the number of enrollees, the close ties of many contractors to executive director Peter Lee, and general mismanagement. Her investigative report, based on whistleblower accounts, is the second in a two-part series on Covered California, which has been touted by Obamacare supporters as the model for how other states should run their programs.

As the U.S.S. Theodore Roosevelt heads to Yemen to confront a convoy of Iranian ships, including destroyers, it is worth asking why President Barack Obama is still talking to the Iranian regime about its nuclear program. The Iranians, who used the Houthi militia to knock over the American-aligned Yemeni government, clearly has no fear that Obama will suspend negotiations. If anything, Iranian tactics are winning more concessions.

Investigative reporter Sharly Atkisson, who uncovered key details of Operation Fast and Furious and the Benghazi scandal, now reports at the Daily Signal that Covered California, the Obamacare health care exchange established by the State of California, is not the success story that boosters claim, but is rather rife with fraud, chaos, and failure.

President Barack Obama’s decision to abandon Iraq remains the most significant strategic blunder in a generation. Putting politics ahead of strategy, Obama sought to win an argument with history rather than to win the struggle against terror and tyranny in the Middle East. His presidential ambitions depended on his opposition to the Iraq War–which, he decided, also meant opposing the “surge.” He could barely admit the surge worked–and, in office, reversed it as soon as possible.

New research suggests that a fault underneath the city of Ventura, roughly one hour northwest of L.A., could produce an 8.0-magnitude earthquake, as well as “severe” tsunamis previously thought impossible in Southern California, the Los Angeles Times reports.

Continuing its tradition of providing a propaganda platform for America’s enemies, the New York Times has published an op-ed by Iranian foreign minister Javad Zarif in which he demands that the United States choose “between cooperation and confrontation, between negotiations and grandstanding, and between agreement and coercion.” Enjoying the freedom of expression his government denies to its opponents, Zarif argues that the West should work with it toward regional peace.

For some in California, April 20th marks the 35th anniversary of Earth Day, a day to celebrate the environment and raise ecological awareness. For others. 4/20 is simply a day to get high on pot. The date–which is said to originate from a tradition among high school students in San Rafael of smoking marijuana at 4:20 in the afternoon– marks an unofficial day of appreciation for all things marijuana- and hemp-related–and a day of activism for legalization of the drug.

Boko Haram, the Islamist terrorist organization, has threatened to kill all South Africans in Nigeria, Niger, Chad and the surrounding region, according to media reports based on a video allegedly released by the group. The threat came as a response to a wave of xenophobic attacks in South Africa, in which ordinary South Africans, primarily blacks, have killed, maimed, abused and expelled other Africans throughout the country, killing seven thus far and displacing thousands.

Joel Kotkin, the noted liberal critic of California’s far-left government, says that Gov. Jerry Brown is leading California to ruin–and that the state’s business leaders share the blame by failing to speak out. In a new essay at the Daily Beast that summarizes much of his recent criticism, Kotkin says that while Brown’s father Pat brought the state progress and prosperity as governor (1959-1967), Jerry Brown “has waged a kind of Oedipal struggle against his father’s legacy.”

Three new dangers have emerged in the last few days alone that should scuttle any nuclear deal with the Iranian regime. If President Barack Obama were truly concerned about American security, he would have ended negotiations, told Congress to pass new sanctions, and prepared the armed forces for military action as a last resort. Instead, out of narcissism and a fear of war at all costs, he is pursuing a peace at any price–one that guarantees war in the future on unfavorable terms.

Desalinization has emerged as an answer to the state’s chronic water shortages. As the Orange County Register notes, desalinization would provide a near-infinite supply of water at only twice the price. The main objection of environmentalists is that desalinization uses up to 50% more electricity, meaning more fossil fuels might be burned to make water, setting back efforts to fight climate change. It is an objection that is looking less and less serious.

President Barack Obama appeared to yield Friday to Iran’s insistence that sanctions be removed immediately when a nuclear deal goes into effect, rather than over time. Rather than lifting sanctions only when Iran is shown to be complying with the agreement, Obama now wants sanctions to be able to “snap back” when Iran is found to be in violation of the deal.

Adm. Mike Mullen, former Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has offered what he admits is a rather weak defense of the Iran deal: he hopes it will lead to regime change by strengthening reformists within the Tehran government. In an op-ed for Politico Magazine, Mullen claims that “Iranian reformists…support a nuclear deal because it would be a first step in the evolution they would like to see.” He also rules out a military option and says that Obama’s deal is the best deal possible.

I can’t pretend to have read all 64 of the amicus briefs filed by outside parties in Obergefell v. Hodges, the Supreme Court’s upcoming case on whether there is a federal constitutional right to same-sex marriage. But I have read one brief closely–the one filed by “same-sex attracted men and their wives” against federalizing gay marriage. The logic is compelling, the stories riveting–and that is why the left is terrified of it, calling it “the worst” of “terrible” arguments against gay marriage.

Syndicated columnist George Will told the inaugural “Disinvitation Dinner” of the William F. Buckley, Jr. Program at Yale that “93 members of the California legislature have never had sex.” Will was referring to the fact that 93 legislators in the California Senate and Assembly voted to pass last year’s SB 967, the so-called “yes means yes” or affirmative consent law, which requires students at state-funded colleges to obtain permission from each other for every stage of sexual contact.

If you still wonder why our nation’s politics are so divided, look no further than Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank’s half-witted attempt to accuse Republicans—and Israelis—of hypocrisy in opposing the Iran deal. The same neocons and Likudniks who opposed any Iran deal, Milbank says, now want to stick with the interim deal, or argue for a “better deal” than the one President Barack Obama is proposing. Conclusion: they are liars, warmongers, and above all, Obama-haters.

Defying threats of a presidential veto, critics of the Iran deal reached a bipartisan compromise on Tuesday that will allow the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act–the “Corker-Menendez bill”–to proceed to a vote with a veto-proof two-thirds majority. The White House has backed down, fearing the embarrassment of a veto override on a key foreign policy issue. Yet the conditions that critics of the Iran deal had to accept will, in fact, make the deal easier to pass in its current form.

President Barack Obama met on Monday with a group of Jewish leaders at the White House in an effort to win their support for the Iran deal–and for passing that deal without approval from Congress. The details of the meeting were not posted, but The Hill reports that the Obama administration sees the outreach as a key part of its effort to prevent the Corker bill, which would require congressional approval of an Iran deal, from reaching the two-thirds majority threshold.

A series of polls makes the case that voters support President Barack Obama’s Iran deal, despite the objections of Republicans in Congress. The latest is the Quinnipiac swing state poll, which finds that voters in Colorado, Iowa and Virginia support a deal with Iran by a 3-to-1 margin. They also support letting Congress decide by a 3-to-1 margin, so the case against the administration’s position is solid. But the poll’s support for the deal is entirely dependent on bad wording that covers up what is actually going on.

Russia announced Monday that it will sell Iran advanced S-300 surface-to-air missiles. The decision, which ends an embargo dating back to 2010, shows that President Barack Obama is rapidly losing control of the international consensus on Iran.

On Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made public suggestions as to how a “bad deal” on Iran’s nuclear program could be improved. He suggested shutting down all of Iran’s underground facilities, and lifting sanctions only when Iran stops carrying out terror and aggression in the region. It was at least the fourth time Netanyahu had proposed clear alternatives to the Iran deal–though U.S. President Barack Obama persists in pretending he has never proposed any.

Hollywood executives are opening their checkbooks–and new Super PACs–for Hillary Clinton as she makes a second run at the presidency. Ted Johnson and James Rainey report for Variety that Hollywood is far more unified behind Clinton than they were in 2008, when Barack Obama successfully split the liberal donor base. This time, heavyweights such as Jeffrey Katzenberg are joining Clinton loyalists like Haim Saban to provide the big money to fuel her 2016 campaign.

California Governor Jerry Brown has received support from an unusual source as he defends the state’s farmers from the charge that they overuse water. The Wall Street Journal editorial page defended California’s farmers in a weekend editorial that takes both liberals and conservatives to task for using agriculture as a “scapegoat.” Brown, meanwhile, visited with farmers north of Sacramento this weekend in a show of solidarity with farmers against accusations of water-wasting.