Joel B. Pollak - Page 333

It is beyond doubt that Barack Obama would not have been a national political figure had it not been for his keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.  In a moment of profound national division over the war in

Former American International Group CEO Hank Greenberg filed a lawsuit for defamation Friday against former New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, who is now running for Comptroller of New York City.  Greenberg, who is seeking $25,000 in damages, cites statements

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told CBS News’ Face the Nation that Iran will reach the “red line” he laid down at the United Nations in Sep. 2012–90% uranium enrichment–within “a few weeks,” and that Israel will be prepared to act.

CNN’s State of the Union with Candy Crowley assessed George Zimmerman’s acquittal on Sunday morning–and featured guests who were overwhelmingly critical of the verdict and skeptical of Zimmerman’s case. NAACP President Ben Jealous, who confirmed that his organization was appealing to

When President Barack Obama harshly criticized members of the military who commit sexual assault, saying that they should be “”prosecuted, stripped of their positions, court-martialed, fired, dishonorably discharged,” he inadvertently created “unlawful command influence” throughout the armed forces that will be

An Israeli submarine was responsible for a July 5 attack on Russian missiles that had been delivered to Syria, the London Sunday Times reports. Israel had warned that such shipments would be legitimate targets. The P-800 anti-ship “Yakhont” missiles had been

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) sent a message to supporters after George Zimmerman was acquitted of murder and manslaughter Saturday evening, asking them to sign a petition urging the Department of Justice to initiate a

Sunny Hostin, a legal analyst who backed the prosecution during CNN’s coverage of the George Zimmerman trial, told viewers Saturday night that the trial had been good because it forced Americans to talk about race.  “One of the good things

The jury in the trial of George Zimmerman is evidently weighing the evidence carefully. After roughly two hours of deliberation, it asked Judge Debra Nelson its first question–namely, for a list of the exhibits of evidence introduced in the trial. 

It is a measure of how far U.S. foreign policy has fallen under President Barack Obama that our relations with Egypt–one of the top recipients of U.S. foreign aid–depend entirely on a lunch in April.  That fortuitous meal was shared

The most dramatic moment yet of the George Zimmerman trial yet occurred during the defense’s closing argument Friday morning, when attorney Mark O’Mara paused for four minutes to illustrate a long gap in the prosecution’s timeline of events.  The television

As it prepares to give its closing arguments in the trial of George Zimmerman on Friday, the defense has a simple–but challenging–task: it must explain what the prosecution would have been required to prove, and that it has failed to

Forget murder. The prosecution has failed to prove the elements of the crime.  So it comes down to manslaughter–and a specific kind of manslaughter, one that lawyers call “imperfect self-defense.”  If George Zimmerman over-reacted to the danger he was in–if,

Conservatives have long derided Democrats as the “party of government,” noting the party’s enthusiasm for government spending and programs. In recent years, campaign finance disclosures have shown that employees of every federal department, including Defense, give overwhelmingly to Democratic candidates.

The recent coup in Egypt has highlighted the fact that Palestinians are not ready for peace with each other, much less Israel. Last week, the Fatah movement that controls the West Bank and the Palestinian Authority executive called for Palestinians

The Wall Street Journal editorial page Wednesday urged Republicans, once again, to pass an immigration reform bill. The Journal has backed off its initial demand that Republicans “improve” the bill, and now asks only that they “pass the parts that are pro-growth.” 

As House Republicans gather to discuss the Senate’s “Gang of Eight” immigration reform bill, which is likely to be rejected, supporters of the legislation have pinned their hopes to an unlikely state: California. Though only fifteen of the state’s fifty-three

The following is adapted from an unpublished manuscript I wrote about my experiences as a freelance writer in Cape Town, South Africa, which included living for two years with a Muslim family in the industrial neighborhood of Salt River. Both

Former New York Governor and Attorney General Eliot Spitzer is now running for New York City Comptroller in the Democratic primary as he, like former and current mayoral candidate Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY), strives to put a sex scandal behind

Al Jazeera has obtained the full text of the secret report of Pakistan’s Abbottabad Commission, which investigated how Osama bin Laden was able to hide in the country for nearly a decade–and how Pakistan’s defense forces had failed to detect

A massive fire on Saturday that destroyed a large portion of a Canadian town and may have killed as many as forty people has also ignited debate about the wisdom of shipping crude oil by rail rather than pipeline.  The

The Egyptian military opened fire on a crowd of unruly Muslim Brotherhood demonstrators who had staged a protest outside a military headquarters Monday, killing at least forty and wounding many others. In response, the country’s other major Islamic party, Nour,

Daryl Impey of South Africa, who became the first African cyclist to earn the yellow jersey at the Tour de France after the race’s sixth stage, yielded the lead to another African-born rider after Satruday’s eighth stage–Chris Froome of the

A veteran airline pilot with thirty-five years of experience, including many flights into San Francisco International Airport (SFO), has told Breitbart News that “wake turbulence,” in combination with pilot error, could have caused Asiana Airlines Flight 214 to crash on

The Israeli media reported Sunday that U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry will be pried free from his yacht to return to the Middle East this week to try, yet again, to convince Israel and the Palestinians to negotiate. In

Much debate surrounds President Barack Obama’s refusal to label the Egyptian coup a “coup.” Doing so would have legal implications for U.S. aid to Egypt, which is one of the administration’s few remaining points of leverage. The Egypt case contrasts

NPR’s Nina Totenberg filed a story summing up the Supreme Court’s contentious recent term. In covering Shelby County v. Holder, the decision to strike down part of the Voting Rights Act, Totenberg managed to find some conservatives who disagreed with the

The government of Turkey has rejected the recent coup in Egypt, describing the ouster of the democratically-elected Muslim Brotherhood regime of Mohamed Morsi as “unacceptable, no matter what the reasons,” the Associate Press reports. Turkey, which is governed by an