Stephan: It is my view that Israel, led by a Trump clone has made a major geopolitical blunder through bullying and incompetence, and it is going to transform the way the people and governments of other nations view them, including in the United States, as this article describes.
The truth that dare not be spoken is that the Western allies of the 1940s did very little to help the Jews, the U.S. even turned away ships filled with Jewish refugees from the Nazis. After the war seeing the concentration camps of the holocaust, seared into the collective consciousness of the West, a horror and embarrassment. Something had to be done, but none of the Christian countries, including the U.S. wanted a great influx of Jewish refugees. And a militant group of Jews did not want that either. They wanted their own country. So the homeland option it was to everyone from the most orthodox Jews, to the Christian evangelicals. The only people disturbed were the Palestinians and their Arab neighbors.
For nearly three-quarters of a century, Israel has relied on that embarrassment and guilt, as their get-out-of-jail card. But the new generation of Jews and Christians are not burdened with that and are seeing Israel just on the terms of what it is doing. It is not to Israel's benefit. This is occurring at the same time that the Middle East is disturbed and the power of oil and, thus, Arab influence is waning. This and the rise of China, I think, are the two major geopolitical trends to watch.
Protesters rallying outside the Israeli consulate in New York on Tuesday. Credit: Dave Sanders/The New York Times
Dan Kleinman does not know quite how to feel.
As a child in Brooklyn he was taught to revere Israel as the protector of Jews everywhere, the “Jewish superman who would come out of the sky to save us” when things got bad, he said.
It was a refuge in his mind when white supremacists in Charlottesville, Va., chanted “Jews will not replace us,” or kids in college grabbed his shirt, mimicking a “South Park” episode to steal his “Jew gold.”
But his feelings have grown muddier as he has gotten older, especially now as he watches violence unfold in Israel and Gaza. His moral compass tells him to help the Palestinians, but he cannot shake an ingrained paranoia every time he hears someone make anti-Israel statements.
“It is an identity crisis,” Mr. Kleinman, 33, said. “Very small in comparison to what is happening in Gaza and the West Bank, but it is still something very strange and weird.”
As the violence escalates in the Middle East, turmoil […]
Stephan: We are going to see more and more of this, and frankly, in this instance, I think the counties immediately adjacent to the border should be allowed to change states. The social outcome data of the Red value states is so inferior, and getting more so day by day, that this is a crazy move, but there is a large part of the U.S. population who either will not or cannot see this.
Oregon Gov. Kate Brown speaks Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2020, in Portland, Ore. Brown and Oregon health officials warned Tuesday of the capacity challenges facing hospitals as COVID-19 case counts continue to spike in the state. Credit: Cathy Cheney/Pool Photo/AP)
Five eastern Oregon counties voted Tuesday to consider joining Idaho, the biggest victory to date for the movement to split off from the Democrat-controlled blue state by redrawing state lines.
— Citizens for Greater Idaho (@GreaterIdaho) May 19, 2021
Citizens for Greater Idaho said that the five rural counties — Sherman, Lake, Grant, Baker and Malheur — approved measures directing county commissioners to promote the concept of border relocation, joining two other counties, Union and Jefferson, that did so in November.
The Nov. 3 election also saw two other counties defeat the Greater Idaho proposal, but on Tuesday, all five counties with the initiatives on the […]
Stephan: As I said in the previous comment, the social outcome data of states controlled by Republicans, compared with that of states controlled by Democrats is startilingly different. The Republican data is markedly inferior (see SR archives)
Republican South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster
Years ago, I was conducting a months-long journalistic investigation into the street violence plaguing a small community in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Doing that reporting was brutal. But a theme emerged among the moms that has never left me.
They felt shame, so much shame they forwent government help. That’s the opposite of what too many conservatives had been telling the public for decades about welfare, a narrative popularized by the welfare-queen myth conjured up by Ronald Reagan.
It illustrates the cruelty of recent decisions by a growing number of Republican governors to cut off extended unemployment benefits to working families because the benefits are supposedly so generous they discourage those on the economic margins from re-entering the workforce as the covid pandemic winds down.
Those moms had lost children to that street violence in multiple ways, often because of the violent drug game. One recounted having to identify her son’s body in the medical examiner’s office. A piece of preserved skin was unrolled in her presence. On it was a tattoo. That’s how she confirmed […]
Stephan: The Trumps saw themselves as royalty and expected you and I to support them to the level their egos were convinced they deserved. The sums coming out describing what that cost are staggering.
Former first lady Melania Trump refused to go to public events with her husband as news became public that he had an affair with Stormy Daniels in the weeks that followed her giving birth to his son. Mrs. Trump sought to go to Mar-a-Lago for a spa weekend instead of being with her husband on international visits.
The facts are part of Washington Post reporter Carol Leonnig’s new book on the lack of funding to sustain the Secret Service.
“Melania Trump reportedly was ‘blindsided’ and ‘furious’ by reports about Trump’s alleged affair with porn star Stormy Daniels, so she took an impromptu, two-day trip to Mar-a-Lago,” The Mercury News reported. “That quick trip possibly cost American taxpayers at least $64,000 in costs, from traveling on a military C-32A plane, the New York Times reported at the time.”On the Raw Story Podcast: Marcus Flowers Marjorie Taylor Green’s worst nightmare
Now that Leonnig is looking back at the costs, the dollars are stacking up. She estimates at least $600 million in Secret Service fees over the four years […]
Stephan: You have probably never heard of any of these corporations, but these 20 companies are destroying earth's matrix of life, and personally degrading your life. What to do? What can an ordinary person do to stop this environmental disaster? Stop buying as many things as you can made of plastic. Citizen power is pocketbook power.
Twenty companies are responsible for producing more than half of all the single-use plastic waste in the world, fuelling the climate crisis and creating an environmental catastrophe, new research reveals.
Among the global businesses responsible for 55% of the world’s plastic packaging waste are both state-owned and multinational corporations, including oil and gas giants and chemical companies, according to a comprehensive new analysis.Quick Guide
The Plastic Waste Makers index reveals for the first time the companies who produce the polymers that become throwaway plastic items, from face masks to plastic bags and bottles, which at the end of their short life pollute the oceans or are burned or thrown into landfill.https://interactive.guim.co.uk/charts/embed/may/2021-05-17T09:28:01/embed.html
It also reveals Australia leads a list of countries for generating the most single-use plastic waste on a per capita basis, ahead of the United States, South Korea and Britain.
