Tag Archive for: Australia

Woke Universities Sacrificing Science on the Altar of Ideology and Profit

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Three case studies from Canada and Australia about suppression of heterodox opinions in universities.

Two thousand five hundred years ago the Greek playwright Aeschylus is reputed to have said “the first victim of war is truth.” Recent events in the academic world have demonstrated that truth is also a casualty when ideology and commercial interests are at stake.

The most recent case occurred last month at Laval University in Canada, when professor and RNA expert Patrick Provost was suspended without pay for anti-mRNA vaccine comments. Patrick Provost has run an RNA lab for 20 years and has published nearly 100 peer-reviewed studies. In 2003, Provost’s work on the role of microRNA in gene expression was named one of the 10 discoveries of the year by the Quebec Science Magazine.

Based on the government’s own hospitalization and mortality statistics for children, which are both very low, Provost said he believed the risks of Covid-19 vaccination in children could outweigh the benefits because of the potential side-effects from mRNA vaccines, which have only gone through two of the usual four stages of testing required before vaccines are approved for general use.

“I was just doing what I was hired to do,” he said in an interview. “I had some concerns about something, I searched the literature and I prepared a talk and I delivered it to the public. Being censored for doing what I’ve been trained to do — and hired to do — well, it’s hard to believe.”

“As soon as you raise some concerns about vaccines, or side-effects, or complications related to vaccines, then it’s worse than the N-word,” he continued. “You’re condemned by the media, by the government and you’re chased and put down …. We should be able to discuss any ideas — any opinions — and because I expressed opinions that went against the government narrative, I was suspended.”

Regarding the University’s reaction, one might well wonder about the fact that the top 20 pharmaceutical companies spent C$139 billion on Research & Development in 2022, a portion of which went to university researchers. Faculties of medicine are particularly favoured beneficiaries of such funding. And Patrick Provost is a professor at the Faculty of Medicine.

In an entirely different field, geophysicist Peter Ridd was sacked in 2018 by James Cook University, in Australia, for criticizing the work of a colleague studying the Great Barrier Reef. In an email to a journalist, he said the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority “is grossly misusing some scientific ‘data’ to make the case that the Great Barrier Reef is greatly damaged.” Ridd maintained that scientific organisations were “quite happy to spin a story for their own purposes, in this case to demonstrate that there is massive damage to the Great Barrier Reef.”

In a report published last year based, like Provost’s talk, on publicly available data, from the Australian Institute of Marine Science, aka the AIMS, Ridd notes that “the average coral cover as of 2022 is (…) the highest level on record. Figure 2 makes it clear that AIMS has effectively hidden the very good news about the reef between 2016 and 2022 by not publishing the Great Barrier Reef average data since 2017.”

Since 2014, the Australian government has committed A$4 billion to saving the Reef. The Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, based at James Cook University, has been a major recipient of this funding. It should be no surprise that Ridd’s colleagues did not take kindly to someone undermining the claims on which their research, and the government funding that subsidizes it, is based.

Back in Canada, Frances Widdowson, a professor of economics, policy, and justice at Mount Royal University in Alberta was fired last year after colleagues and activists called for her termination because she dared to challenge groupthink on indigenous issues. Widdowson had made the self-evident claim that residential schools provided access to education that otherwise might not have been available, which was not an endorsement of the residential school system, but a mere statement of fact. A large percentage of Indian parents willingly opted for residential schools as they were the only way for their children to get an education. Despite the factuality of the claim, she was vilified and called a “denialist.”

Widdowson observes that no one dare question indigenous leaders in Canada these days, which makes it difficult to check their claims about buried remains of children. Widdowson has remarked that while lurid talk of buried indigenous children has circulated for more than 25 years and is “now firmly ensconced within the Canadian consciousness,” there is still no hard evidence to support it. Not a single body has been found at the Kamloops Indian Residential School where 215 bodies were allegedly detected by ground-penetrating radar.

Widdowson’s words in her last hearing at the disciplinary committee just before being fired are worth quoting as a moral to these stories:

“My final thought is that I don’t think it’s understood, not just at Mount Royal but in universities generally, that there is a fundamental conflict between academic universities, academic values and these ideological types of intrusions which are put forward under a number of different names, whether it be diversity, inclusion or equity policies. (…). I’m being pushed out because I can’t accept things that I believe to be untrue. I can’t say that I think something is true when I don’t think it’s true and I think it would be a violation of my academic position to do that. And unfortunately there are people who are either opportunistic or just afraid who won’t stand behind the academic foundation of the university.”

The university is now a house without foundations. We all know what eventually happens to such houses.

AUTHOR

Patrick Duffley

Patrick Duffley is Professor of English Linguistics at Université Laval, in Canada. More by Patrick Duffley.

RELATED ARTICLE: Mr. President, Fire Your Woke Minions And Appoint Some Competent People

EDITORS NOTE: This MercatorNet column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

‘Leave them kids alone’, sang Pink Floyd in 1979. Now it’s: ‘We’ll convert your children’

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Parents need to wake up to the possibility of LGBTQ+ indoctrination.

February 2023 is the month where the LGBTQ+ juggernaut ramped up its attempt to convert our children and to destroy any notion that heterosexuality has a God-given beauty.

Let’s start with WorldPride 2023.

In the run-up to the global fleshfest (and you’ll see why I chose that word as you read on), several stories have enraged local residents in Sydney, and rightfully so.

Public pornography

The first was the “gay bear mural” of a large hairy, naked man, dressed in bondage straps, with a teddy bear’s head smiling at onlookers. This was strategically positioned near to Wynyard, one of Sydney’s central city stations. This is hardly an image a healthy society would want little city kids to stare at on their way to school.

Someone took matters into their own hands and painted over the controversial gay pride mural, daubing over it with the words “leave the kids alone”. Of course, Australia’s leading gay newspaper denounced the defacers as “homophobic vandals”, and yet I have several gay friends who tell me they believe it was a wholly inappropriate image.

The next case was multiple identical images spread across the city of Sydney. Created by @Scottie.Marsh, they were a play on the angel wings mural street art now found in most cities. This one wasn’t heavenly focussed but was crudely called #dickwings. It was made up of 124 images of penises compacted together instead of feathers.

The distributors of this perverted image did not forget about the children. Oh, no. They were painted low enough for toddlers and children to pose in a rainbow of phallic symbols, a picture for the family photo album. Yes, the words “Man’s Best Friend” were placed alongside the lower mural so as to get distributors out of trouble, claiming it was meant only for animals at that height, but my Sydney friends speak of kids being pressured into being photographed by reckless adults — just “as fun” of course. Quietly and subtly, the kids are converted.

If this isn’t indoctrination, what is?

Impressionable targets

“Leave them kids alone”: this is exactly what LGBTQ+ activists don’t want to do. Minors are unquestionably their focus.

The San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus told us this brazenly through their “Message from the Gay Community” in their video “We’ll convert your children” in 2021. If you never read their lyrics, then just some of them are as follows:

You think that we’ll corrupt your kids
If our agenda goes unchecked
Funny, just this once, you’re correct

We’ll convert your children
Happens bit by bit
Quietly and subtlely
And you will barely notice it

Just like you worriеd
They’ll change their group of friеnds
You won’t approve of where they go at night
Oh, and you’ll be disgusted
When they start finding things online
That you’ve kept far from their sight

We’ll convert your children
Reaching one and all
There’s really no escaping it

Pink Floyd had had us all screaming “Teacher, leave them kids alone” in their classic hit, “Another Brick in the Wall”. That was 1979. Unacceptable then — now it’s all but mandatory, and nowhere more visible than through the falsely-named ‘Safe Schools’ pro-LGBTQ+ material sown throughout many Australian students’ schooling years.

The never-ending LGBTQ+ propaganda machine, which operates on the three stages of desensitisation, jamming and conversion, is outlined in Paul Rondeau’s famous article, Selling Homosexuality to America. Its penultimate paragraph is:

“Gay rights is not about the attainment of truth nor social justice but the achievement of power. The battle centers on the control of public discourse through marketing and persuasion, to shape what society thinks about and how they think about it. Homosexual activists envision that a decision is ultimately made without society ever realizing that it has been purposely conditioned to arrive at a conclusion that it thinks is its own.”

Our kids are being indoctrinated online by videos from drag queens like Trixie Mattel and Katya. One of their hundreds of videos has nearly 7 million views. Its topic is “Straight People”. The drag queens say:

“… backpedalling to the true monsters — the heterosexuals”

“straight people are gross”

“I think of the oppression that we escape as gay people, and I think of straight people living it forever.”

Sometimes we hear the excuse that anything the LGBTQI+ community does and says is permissible: “Sorry, can’t help it — I’m gay!”. But public displays of perversion, intolerance, bigotry and hatred cannot be justified because of a minority’s sexual feelings. It appears that LGBTQI+ activists don’t know how not to be overtly sexual and how not to distribute and celebrate depravity.

Stifling choice

Anthony “Albo” Albanese prides himself on being the first Australian prime minister to march in Sydney’s Mardi Gras, claiming to news cameras, “Everyone should be respected for who they are and tonight’s a celebration of that, and it’s a great example of what an amazing country this is.”

Everyone should be respected, Albo? What about the disrespect shown to traumatised same-sex attracted or gender dysphoric citizens who want to pursue proven, life-giving therapy (and prayer) which has already been banned in one territory and two of Australia’s six states, with the remaining four states possibly on the way unless parents and concerned others speak up now?

These laws disrespect same-sex attracted and gender dysphoric people and cause them grave harm. They are already leading to greater mental anguish in the lives of those who can no longer access services which previously for some have made the difference between living life and existing on the brink of death.

I end with news coming out of the UK, which often experiences events that swiftly land on Australian soil.

Dr Bernard Randall, 50, a school chaplain, at a private Christian high school, Trent College, in Nottingham, has been sacked for defending the right of his students to question the new LGBT policies which were enforced upon them.

The school authorities decided that his sermon was harmful to pupils and secretly reported him to the anti-terrorism Prevent programme — which normally identifies those at risk of radicalisation. Then they fired him.

“We will appeal, so it takes up yet more of my life,” he said. “But it is only one battle in the war to preserve free speech and the liberal values which built our country.”

Disagreement with LGBTQ+ policies is terrorism? Every parent, grandparent, and safeguarder of children should be speaking up. I can assure that this Orwellian intolerance is on the way. As a former gay activist, I see WorldPride 2023 as a World Attack on Heterosexuality 2023. Australia has little to be proud of after hosting this event.

AUTHOR

James Parker

James Parker was a gay rights’ activist. He now facilitates True Identity, an informal network that supports those struggling with sexuality & gender identity issues. More by James Parker

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EDITORS NOTE: This MercatorNet column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

In Listing Hamas as a Terror Group, Australia Shows the Bankruptcy of the Left

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Australia finally got around to listing the infamous jihad terror group known as the Islamic Resistance Movement, and better known as Hamas, as a terrorist group on Thursday. That’s great, even though it should have been done years ago. The way that Australian authorities chose to do it, however, once again demonstrated the moral cowardice and intellectual bankruptcy of the Left: the Australians had to find a way to condemn Hamas without appearing to be “Islamophobic.” They found a way to do that, but they didn’t find a way to avoid appearing to be woke, politically correct fools.

The Associated Press reported Thursday that Australia has “added the U.S.-based far-right extremist group National Socialist Order and planned to add the entirety of the Palestinian group Hamas to its list of outlawed terrorist organisations as concerns rise about radicalised children.”

Now, it’s easy to see why Hamas is being added to the list of outlawed terrorist organizations. Just in the past few days, its plan to target Israelis living in the Philippines was thwarted. It celebrated the murder of a 91-year-old Holocaust survivor. Before that, it sent rockets into Israel on New Year’s Eve. The leader of the Hamas Women’s Movement has claimed that all the Muslim women in Gaza are ready to blow themselves up in jihad suicide bombings.

And that’s just recently. For decades now, Hamas has called for and worked toward the total destruction of Israel, which would necessarily involve a new genocide of the Jews. For years, its website featured a “Glory Record” detailing its murders of Israeli civilians. Hamas also receives funding from the Islamic Republic of Iran, which is just as genocidal and anti-Semitic as Hamas itself.

At the same time as it announced intentions to list Hamas as a terror group, Australia’s Home Affairs Minister Karen Andrews announced that it had also added “the National Socialist Order, formerly known as Atomwaffen Division,” to its terror list. It seems that the National Socialist Order “advocates a global ‘race war’ and the collapse of democratic societies.” This is not the first “far-right” group that Australia has added to its terror list: “The Base, a neo-Nazi white supremacist group formed in the United States in 2018, was listed in December and the British-based Sonnenkrieg Division was listed in August.”

Undeniably, neo-Nazis are horrible people, and I have no doubt that the National Socialist Order thoroughly deserves to be listed as a terrorist group. But why did Australia have to add the National Socialist Order to its terror list as it added Hamas? Have you ever even heard of the National Socialist Order before reading this article? The ADL says that the Atomwaffen Division “is a small neo-Nazi group,” and that “a series of arrests in 2019-20 decimated the group’s active membership.” It adds that “in July 2020, AWD was disbanded, and the National Socialist Order emerged under the remaining AWD leadership.”

So the National Socialist Order is a rump group formed out of another that collapsed, and is likely to be an insignificant band of potbellied LARPing sociopaths, or else FBI agents trying to validate a “far-right” threat. That hardly compares to Hamas, an organization that for years has terrorized a nation with jihad rocket attacks and attacks on civilians. Hamas has international support, most notably from the Islamic Republic of Iran, while no nation has or ever will given support to the National Socialist Order.

So why has Australia only listed Hamas as a terror group in tandem with this insignificant band of Nazi idiots? The answer is clear. Australian authorities are trying to prop up the National Socialist Order as some kind of moral equivalent to Hamas, in order to try to avoid enraging its Muslim population, among whom are numerous Hamas supporters, and to avoid giving the impression that the Australian government is “Islamophobic” and is targeting only Islamic terrorists while ignoring non-Muslim terrorists.

This sort of thing isn’t limited to Australia, of course. I myself am banned from Britain in the British government’s absurd attempt to smear me as a “far right” leader on par with jihad terrorists. Then-Prime Minister Theresa May said in 2016: ““And I acted to keep those who peddle hatred and extremism out of our country. I kicked out Abu Hamza and Abu Qatada. I stopped Pamela Geller, Robert Spencer and Pastor Terry Jones – because Islamophobia comes from the same wellspring of hatred. And I stopped people like Dieudonne coming to Britain. Because nothing excuses antisemitism – not comedy, not satire, not even irony. Antisemitism is just hatred. And it is just wrong.”Spen

So as far as May was concerned, Pamela Geller and I were the “Islamophobic” equivalents of Abu Hamza and Abu Qatada. Abu Hamza is in solitary confinement in a super-max U.S. for, among other things, conspiring to set up a training camp for jihad terrorists in Bly, Oregon. Abu Qatada was convicted of plotting the jihad massacre of Americans and Israelis in Jordan. Neither Geller nor I have ever advocated or condoned any violence at all. But May needed some “far-right extremists” to balance her actions against jihadis and appease Muslims in Britain, and so she didn’t hesitate to smear us.

In fact, calling the National Socialist Order “far-right,” the same term that is used for people (including me) who aren’t remotely Nazi and are simply enunciating unwelcome truths, shows how the term is employed as a weapon to stigmatize, demonize, and marginalize all those whom the elites hate. Lump us in with some Nazi idiots, and the job is done.

It’s good that Australia will list Hamas as a terror group. But the way Australian officials have done it shows them to be Leftist cowards and self-deluded fools.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Muslim migrant city councillor starts fight outside gay club, screams ‘Allahu akbar,’ ‘I will make sure these faggots die’

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Celebrate diversity! You have a problem with this? What are you, some kind of Islamophobe?

Greens councillor accused of starting fight, launching homophobic tirade

by Cameron Houston, The Age, May 20, 2021:

A Yarra City councillor has been accused of starting an altercation with another woman outside a gay club in South Yarra, before the councillor allegedly exclaimed “Allahu Akbar” and vowed to “make sure all these faggots die”.

Anab Mohamud, a member of the Australian Greens, allegedly launched the homophobic tirade after sustaining serious facial injuries from the assault on April 11, according to a witness statement.

The statement was recently provided to Victoria Police detectives, who continue to investigate the incident outside Chasers nightclub, which hosts the popular LGBTQ dance party Poof Doof.

The security guard said he called an ambulance and attempted to administer first aid to Cr Mohamud immediately after the assault on Bray Street.

“[Cr Mohamud] told me numerous times to ‘bring that bitch back, I’ll f— her up’. She has also yelled out various things, such as ‘f— the LG family’ and also said something in what I believe was in Arabic and not understandable, followed by words along the line of, ‘I swear to Allah if I lose my eye I will make sure all these faggots die,’ ” the guard alleges in a statement to police.

Video footage obtained by The Age shows Cr Mohamud and a male companion walking down Bray Street about 3.40am, when she stops outside a caged smoking area to the rear of Chasers nightclub.

Another witness, who works as a manager at Poof Doof, told police Cr Mohamud reached through the bars of the smoking area and grabbed a “trans woman” by the hair.

The manager, who asked not to be identified, said he attempted to separate the pair.

“As I got to [the patron], I looked out the metal bars and saw that her head was being pulled against the metal gate bars by a female [Cr Mohamud] out on Bray Street … She was screaming, ‘F— you, I’m going to get you,’ ” the manager said in a sworn statement made on May 17.

Once separated, the patron opened an emergency door and pursued Cr Mohamud along Bray Street before the altercation occurred.

The manager alleges in his statement that Cr Mohamud was yelling “Allahu Akbar” – the Muslim declaration that God is great – after the incident.

He also alleges that her male associate said to him: “Do you know who the f— she is, you’ve messed with the wrong woman. She knows all the gangs, they will f— you up.”…

Cr Mohamud, who came to Australia as a Somali refugee 20 years ago and now lives in the Atherton Gardens Estate, says she has a “strong connection to Greens values”, according to her profile on the Australian Greens website….

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EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. All rights reserved.

Muslim women accuse Ayaan Hirsi Ali of ‘white supremacism’

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Islam critic Ayaan Hirsi Ali has hit back at Australian Muslim women for accusing her of being a white supremacist and a misogynist, describing them as apologists for terrorist groups.

Anyone who criticizes Islam legitimately for its Sharia-sanctioned abuse of women, apostates and infidels is deemed “a white supremacist” and an “Islamophobe.” The absurdity of referencing Ayaan Hirsi Ali (who has herself been victimized in the name of Islam) as a “white supremacist” exposes the stealth agenda of Islamic supremacists, along with the useful idiots who assist them in advancing their Sharia objectives.

ayaanhirsiali“‘Shutting people up raising awareness about Sharia law’: Islam critic Ayaan Hirsi Ali hits back at Muslim women accusing her of being a ‘white supremacist’ – after she was forced to cancel Australian tour over security”, by Stephen Johnson, UK Daily Mail, April 5, 2017:

Islam critic Ayaan Hirsi Ali has hit back at Australian Muslim women for accusing her of being a white supremacist and a misogynist, describing them as apologists for terrorist groups.

Six Muslim women, including four wearing hijabs, feature in a video describing the Somali-born writer and former refugee as someone who marginalises followers of Islam.

The three-minute clip, posted on Facebook by a group called Persons of Interest, describes Ms Ali as a racist and sexist person.

They overlook how she is a black woman who campaigns against female genital mutilation.

‘This is the language of patriarchy and misogyny. This is the language of white supremacy. This is the language used to justify war and genocide,’ the women say.

They posted the video on Monday, after Ms Ali’s AHA Foundation and event organisers Think Inc announced she had abruptly cancelled her Australian tour for security reasons.

Speaking from the United States, Ms Ali accused the woman of ‘carrying water’ for Islamist extremist groups campaigning for a global caliphate based on sharia law.

The 47-year-old former Dutch politician linked them to the Egyptian-based Muslim Brotherhood, which is outlawed in its home nation, Islamic State and Boko Haram, which captured 276 schoolgirls in 2014.

Moroccan Soup Bar owner Hana Assafiri, who featured in the video, is the same person who was a spokeswoman for a change.org petition calling for Ms Ali’s Australian tour to be cancelled.

That petition was authored by Islamic Museum of Australia board director Sherene Hassan.

Daily Mail Australia contacted Ms Assafiri for comment on Tuesday.

However, on Monday she declined to criticise sharia law, which secular Muslims reject.

‘Sharia law is a whole massive conversation we need time to discuss and debate with,’ she said.

‘It’s not something I can give you a quick sound bite.’

Zerin Firoze, a former Muslim turned atheist who lives in New York, denounced the video.

‘This is the dumbest video I have seen recently,’ she said on Facebook.

‘Ex-Muslims like Ayaan Hirsi Ali are not demonising Muslim women or Islam.

‘Islam itself demonises Muslims, especially Muslim women.’

Ms Ali, a former Muslim turned atheist who spent part of her childhood in Saudi Arabia, has called for a reformation of Islam so the Koran isn’t taken literally and individual rights are respected…..

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VIDEO: Bill O’Reilly calls for one year moratorium on refugee resettlement

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I happened to catch his talking points memo last night.

However, he didn’t have the story exactly accurate on Australia.  He praised that country for its tough stance on illegal migrants as if it’s always been that way. But for those interested in digging in to the facts there, see our category on Australia (184 posts going back 8 years) and see that their hardline stance is relatively recent and that the country foolishly admitted, for years, large numbers of Muslim migrants that are now pretty aggressive.

O’Reilly also mentioned the strange deal that the Obama Administration is advancing where we would take off Australia’s hands hundreds (at least) of Australia’s rejected asylum seekers (our coverage here) presently housed in off-shore detention facilities.

However, here is the part we liked best in O’Reilly’s statement.  Thanks to Media Matters for tracking this type of story more closely than some on our side do.

You can see 3 + minutes of the statement by O’Reilly by clicking here.  (I see they left out the Australia portion.) You may not like some of O’Reilly’s prescriptions for dealing with our illegal aliens living in the US.

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American Jewish friends: Are we talking about you or someone you know?

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Netanyahu obama israel

Bibi tête-à-tête Obama.

We were prompted to post an earlier version of this on my Facebook page in response to a Jewish Press op-ed by Varda Meyers Epstein, “How Could we Have Known: Jews who voted for Obama.” A native of Pittsburgh who made aliyah to Israel; she ably cataloged a number of warning signals about President Obama who has proven to be a cunning transformationalist.  Here are Ms. Epstein’s opening and closing tropes.

Beginning in 2007, those of us who saw the writing on the wall began campaigning against Obama. We knew he was bad for Israel from the things he said in interviews and from the people he hung out with, past and present. We posted articles that slammed him on social media and we lost friends for our insistent and incessant need to make our case: the one that would save Israel and Israeli Jews.

[…]

You want to tell me you really didn’t know about Obama’s hatred for the Jews and for Israel? Sorry, but I’m having trouble buying that story. But at the very least, you need to come out from under that rock and get a little, um, daylight. You’ve been looking a little pale since Tuesday.

We added to Ms. Epstein’s dossier with those of our own  thereby expanding on her theme.  After posting it on my Facebook page we received a welter of  “likes” and positive comments  from Australia, Canada, Israel and the U.S.  My chaver, ZoA stalwart in Philadelphia, Steve Feldman, who runs the Israel Activism Facebook page, thought it was “stupendous”.  A bit of hyperbole that, but thanks for the compliment, Steve.  However, I was brought up short by another chaver in Calgary, Bill Narvey, who, while he agreed with what I said, could we please “paragraph “it.  So here is a suitable presentation for Narvey and others.  The title for this piece was borrowed from a headline on Feldman’s Facebook post of what we originally wrote:

[H]ow could normally sensible Jewish Democrats have believed all that hokum about “Hope and Change” back in 2007 from an untried US Senator from Illinois who never completed a full term in office after leveraging a speech at the 2004 Democratic convention and two ghost written New York Times biographies allegedly by Bill Ayres . Who as a State Senator from Chicago voted present 100 times in the Illinois state legislature?

Or allied himself to the anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian crowd at annual dinners of the Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee with Michelle and him seated at a table back in 1998 with one of his alleged mentors, the late Columbia Professor Edward Said.  Or when he told his Chicago Pal Ali Abunimah of The Electronic Intifada blog, during his run for US Senate backed by the gullible Chicago Jewish billionaires from the Pritzker and Crown Families of the Standard Club, that he wouldn’t forget both Abunimah and the Palestinian cause when he got to Washington.

Tell them how Obama lied about he had Israel’s back or that there was no diplomatic daylight between the US under his helm with Israel the only democratic ally in the Middle East. Tell them how he undertook secret negotiations with Iran back in the fall of his 2012 re-election using his Chicago mentor Valarie Jarrett to discuss a possible Iran nuke deal with Ali Akbar Salehi in Dubai, her childhood friend from living in Iran with her Chicago doctor father and mother after her birth in Shiraz.

Or ask them to explain how the July 14th announcement of a Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action to cut off Iran from a bomb was followed by a UN Security Council unanimous endorsement a week later. That was less than a day after the Iran nuke pact was submitted to Congress for a review and vote by Rosh Ha Shanah in 2015.

Ask them why Iran’s nuclear infrastructure remains in place and the EU-3 will commit to hardening it preventing Israel from sabotaging it. Ask them if they ever thought a sitting President would use his executive powers to transform this country into just another member of the multilateral Euro-trash socialist club. Ask them why he cozyied up to the Muslim Brotherhood both in the Middle East and here in the US, only to dump them for apocalyptic End times Shiite Iran giving them a free pass to arm Hamas and Hezbollah and boost the Islamic State ranging on Israel’s borders.

Yes, tell your talented chaverim v mispochim who funded and voted for Obama, not once, but twice, that he is laughing at them behind their backs now that he honored his commitment to his Chicago radical and Palestinian fellow travelers. Tell them to watch out for the Palestinian State UN Resolution that may be introduced for a vote soon now that his Iran nuke pact legacy has been endorsed by the Security Council even before the General Assembly UN meetings in September in Manhattan. Tell them to watch him manipulate gullible Jewish Democratic Members of Congress securing a yes vote for the Iran nuke deal enabling him to veto any negative majority GOP and minority Democrat vote by Rosh Ha Shanah.

Tell them all that and ask them finally, why they voted for this destroyer of their children and grand children’s futures here in America and in Israel. Go ahead, ask them that.

Then tell them to watch this NER You Tube video interview with contributing NER editor, Dr. Richard L. Rubenstein in June 2010.  Tell them to note his prescient bottom line assessment of Obama, as “the the most radical President, ever:”

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review.

Anthrax Released: Should we be concerned?

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US Army Dugway Proving Ground Main GateThe abrupt news that live anthrax samples  had been shipped from the U.S. Army Dugway proving ground to laboratories in the U.S., an air base in South Korea and possibly Australia came as a reminder to Americans and the world that biological warfare  training exercises might lead to troubling inadvertent releases. Fortunately, 22 military personnel exposed at the south Korean  airbase are being treated with the antibiotic Cipro. However, this latest release of a BW agent has caused both the U.S. Army bio-warfare directorate and the CDC to review safety precautions, packaging and procedures for the transmission of possible live anthrax spores and why samples had not been made inert?

The BBC reported that the U.S. military has ordered a review of how it handles anthrax after discovering more cases of live samples being accidentally sent to labs:

Live anthrax samples were believed to have been sent to a total of 24 labs, in 11 U.S. states as well as South Korea and Australia, the Pentagon said.

The Pentagon says that there is no known risk to the general public.

Experts in bio-safety have heavily criticized the lapse and called for improved precautions.

Symptoms of anthrax exposure include skin ulcers, nausea, vomiting and fever, and can cause death if untreated.

News of the live shipments first emerged on Wednesday, as the U.S. said it had accidentally shipped live anthrax spores from Utah to labs in Texas, Maryland, Wisconsin, Delaware, New Jersey, Tennessee, New York, California and Virginia, as well as an air base in South Korea.

Those shipments took place between March 2014 and April 2015, a U.S. official said, according to Reuters.

On Friday, the Department of Defense said it had identified “additional inadvertent live anthrax shipments”, including a suspect sample sent to Australia from a batch of anthrax from 2008.

It is not clear when that sample was shipped to Australia.

The military has ordered all of its labs that have previously received inactive anthrax samples to test them. In addition it is advising all labs to cease working with these samples until told otherwise.

Shortly after 9/11, the American public concern over bio-terrorism was raised  by the release of Anthrax in powdered form in letters sent to members of Congress and randomly to private persons. 22 persons were sickened, 5 died, the U.S. Senate building was shut down and inspected.  Anthrax exists naturally, but more powerful variants have been developed synthetically by dual use laboratories in rogue states like Iran, North Korea and Assad’s Syria.  Bio-warfare laboratories have been established by Al Qaeda and ISIS has been rumored to have obtained access to materials in Syria, as well. Remember the arrest in Afghanistan, prosecution and conviction in the U.S. of Brandeis University and MIT trained scientist, “Lady Al Qaeda”, Aafia Siddiqui .  There is also evidence that Iran’s terrorist proxy, Hezbollah may have been transferred BW capabilities and agents  by Syria that could be deployed against America’s ally , Israel and globally through major transportation nodes in Europe.

Jill Bellamy van Aalst(3)

Dr. Jill Bellamy

We asked Dr. Jill Bellamy, noted expert on biological warfare and threat reduction about this latest incident.  We have published articles by Dr. Bellamy on Syrian, Hezbollah, Al Qaeda and Iranian BW programs in both the NER and our blog the Iconoclast.

She commented:

Clearly from a bio-safety perspective this is a very serious breach of protocol and demands a full and transparent investigation. As anyone who works with inactivated anthrax would be routinely vaccinated with AVA, exposure from a clinical perspective is probably not as much of a concern as the general public may believe. Of course if anyone outside military labs the live anthrax was sent to and persons who have not been routinely vaccinated were exposed, this would be concerning. I would worry about the time frame from exposure. It appears from the reports that we are talking about several weeks or months during which the anthrax was shipped. It is probably a good sign that none of the labs has reported a laboratory acquired disease or LAD. If exposure is known Cipro (ciprofloxacin hydrochloride) is given for inhalation anthrax and usually a 60 day course is advised. The lab workers in these labs  would surely  have all been vaccinated, so how much of a health risk it poses is debatable.

The bio-safety side is more worrying. CDC and a number of other labs have previously had exposures from the accidental handling of live anthrax. There are very stringent regulations in place for the shipping and transport of live agents. It is doubtful there was any risk to public health during the transport as this would be handled by the military. What is more problematic is that the research done  at US Army labs and Dugway proving ground  are critical to national security.  Incidents like this feed an uninformed section in non-proliferation circles who then call for the closing of these labs or hype the danger they pose to the general public. It makes it more difficult to assure the public that such labs are a vital aspect to protecting citizens from BW attacks and ensuring vaccines and therapeutic countermeasures are available and stockpiled in the event of a deliberate attack. Hopefully this is an incident we will learn a great deal from in terms of bio-safety training, protocols and bio-security.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is of  microscopic anthrax spores. Source: Reuters.

House Intelligence Committee Benghazi Report Misleads and Conceals Facts

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dark forces timmermanKen Timmerman, author of Dark Forces: The Truth about What Happened in Benghazi   was interviewed Wednesday, November 26, 2014 on 1330AM WEBY  in Pensacola by host Mike Bates and this writer.  This is the third in a series of interviews with Timmerman on the Benghazi terrorist attack that took the lives of four Americans, US Ambassador to Libya, J. Christopher Stevens, Foreign Service Information Manager Sean Smith, and CIA security contractors, Tyrone Power and Glen Doherty.  This latest interview with Timmerman was occasioned by the recently released House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) chaired by outgoing Rep.  Mike Rogers (R-MI).

Timmerman’s views expressed in the interviews are reflective of his Daily Caller, article, “House Intelligence Committee Report Obfuscates Benghazi Arms Smuggling.“  His views parallel those of ex-CIA agent Larry Johnson and Col. Dick Brauer of Special Operations Speaks, that we posted: “UPDATE: The Benghazi House Permanent Select Intelligence Committee Report is a “Whitewash”. Overall Timmerman considers the report, “lame” and a “whitewash” of the conduct by the Administration and the Central Intelligence Agency leadership. He especially called in to question Deputy Director Michael Morell and the Chiefs of Base in Benghazi.

Timmerman believes the media abetted this deception by suggesting that the HPSCI Report exonerated the Administration and the CIA dismissing so-called conspiracy theories.  He noted that given the short news cycle following the release of the report, Friday, November 21, 2014, the press barely had time to digest the 37 page report let alone delve into the underlying transcripts.    Report findings denying that there was no stand down orders have been contradicted by surviving CIA security contractors in the book 13 Hours.  Those contractors engaged in the battle at the Annex  said  that the Chief of Base in Benghazi had issued such stand down orders  several times, resulting in a critical 21 minute delay  too late, to rescue Amb. Stevens and aide Sean Smith. When asked his opinion, Timmerman said that with arms and equipment already in a vehicle, the CIA contractors if released in a timely manner might have saved the lives of both Ambassador Stevens and Smith.

Timmerman said that the Report leaves many unanswered questions that might be addressed by the House Select Committee on Benghazi, led by Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC). He doesn’t believe that possible GOP Senate creation of a parallel Select Benghazi Committee in the 114th Session beginning January 2015 would be productive.  He noted there have already been five House Committee investigations, including this final report issued by the HPSCI.

On the matter of arms shipment from Libya to Syrian opposition, Timmerman drew a fine line between so-called Presidential Findings authorizing covert operations and liaison with foreign intelligence agencies, the latter not subject to Congressional oversight.   He said the CIA briefings on covert operations in Benghazi under Presidential findings were typically given to the Chairs and Ranking Members of both the House and Senate Intelligence Committees and the Senate Majority and Minority leaders as well as the House Speaker and Minority Leader, the so-called ‘eight Cardinals.’  According to his sources none of the briefed Congressional members made any objections. Timmerman, following the revelations by ex-CIA agent Johnson, indicated the filtration of arms was accomplished through a ‘cut out involving British, Turkish, and Qatari Intelligence and Australian contractors.

According to Timmerman, a 400 ton shipment of arms on the vessel Al Entisar was sent by a Libyan Jihadist group to a Turkish Muslim Brotherhood charity, IHH.  That attracted Western press whose reports embarrassed CIA Director Gen. David Petreaus and led to former Secretary of State Clinton dispatching the late Ambassador Stevens to Benghazi to shut the operation down.  The Turkish Embassy General Consul, who Stevens met in Benghazi on the evening of 9/11/2012, was likely an intelligence official.  Timmerman commented that Stevens had conducted liaison with Islamist Libyan militias during the Arab Spring rebellion against Gaddafi.  He said that was reflective of the Administration’s distinction that there were good versus bad Jihadists.

When asked about what was going on at the CIA Annex in Benghazi, Timmerman pointed out there were two groups of intelligence personnel there, not including the CIA security contractors at the Annex.  One group of CIA operatives was monitoring the activities of local Islamist militia and the arms filtration cut out operation with foreign intelligence agencies. Not even mentioned in the HSPCI report, Timmerman contends was the presence of NSA agents intercepting communications of local Islamist militias and Iranian Quds Force operatives in Benghazi.  Timmerman agrees with the comments of Col. Brauer that the Iranian Quds Force operatives had surveyed the Annex in Benghazi preparing it for a possible mortar attack.

Timmerman noted the HSPCI Report comment that use of mortars by the Taliban in Afghanistan was woefully inaccurate reflecting little training in the use of such weapons. Col. Brauer said in an interview with this writer that Soviet 82 mm mortars require a team of four and weigh over 120 pounds. Moreover, each rounds weighs over 7 pounds. Brauer pointed to the expertise in the use of mortars by the Iranian Quds force and military during the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980’s. Timmerman believes that members of the Quds Force in Benghazi were possibly involved in preparation and execution of the mortar attack in Benghazi.

Col. Brauer’s sources suggested that some Republican members of the HPSCI may not have been consulted on the release of Final Report.  That prompted observations by Timmerman that in too many instances, ruling majority parties are often side tracked by the interests of Chairman and Ranking Members.  That may have played a part in the timing of the release of the House Intelligence Committee report. Timmerman noted former CIA Director Michael Morell’s role in editing the talking points exonerating the Administration and subsequently joining a Washington, DC-based strategic consulting firm, Beacon Global Strategies.  The firm with close connections to former aides of Secretary Hillary Clinton and former Pentagon Chief, Leon Panetta.  Also joining the firm as Managing Director was Michael Allen former Majority Chief of Staff to outgoing House Intelligence Committee Chair, Mike Rogers.  It appears that the revolving door in Washington Intelligence circles creates conflicts overarching important national security interests.

Listen to the 1330 am WEBY interview with Ken Timmerman:

Segment 1, Segment 2, Segment 3, Segment 4.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review.