Voter ID and Crime Prevention

On voter ID fraud:

Let's, for the sake of argument, assume that there is no evidence readily available for truly massive voter ID fraud, likely because voter ID lists are not public.

But it's very easy to see how a system with NO voter ID requirements could be abused.

As with anything else, including cybersecurity, if you know of a vulnerability, why not patch it up, before bad guys take advantage of it and a crime is committed? What is the argument for opposing crime prevention?

Net Neutrality Discussion Fail

I have yet to see a single net neutrality advocate in good faith explain to me how my life as an individual user was seriously affected before 2015 (because the only issue in discussion right now is Obama's order), and why the world will suddenly change to substantially worse than pre-2015 with the current repeal. The arguments by Net Neutralians that have been presented so far have nothing to do with the specifics of the actual regulation being repealed, but are rather theoretical worst-case scenario of the early days of discussion on net neutrality in academic settings. Republicans, by the way, as usual did a terrible job, by and large, presenting a public argument of how the repeal is limited to a very narrow regulation, which had very little with the larger argument of net neutrality to begin with.

Taking One For the Team

In a year fraught with sex scandals, sophomoric election jokes about "pulling it off" and "pulling it out", just write themselves...

That's why I will never be anyone serious in politics.

Alabama: Incredibly Loud and Extremely Close

Alabama: An extremely close race is now called for Doug Jones (D).

It takes real effort for a Republican to lose Alabama, but doggone it, Roy Moore managed this difficult task.

Doug Jones is no better than Moore and I'm not celebrating.

I think it's a loss over all that the state was stuck with two such horrific candidates, and one of them is going to a US senator for the next two years, impeding any good that the Republicans may try to accomplish. And he's a rabid pro-abortion advocate, so in my view, also a deeply immoral person.
The only good news here is that the GOP is not stuck with the extremely awkward choice of what to do with Roy Moore, and will not have that legacy hanging over its head two years from now.
Let's hope Republicans learn a lesson from this and will nominate people who are not so repulsive that they turn off more than half of their own party in the deepest of deep red states.

Why anti-Jerusalem statement protests around the world are fake news

Interestingly, governments in the countries where there are massive protests going on, as well as physical attacks on Jewish sites (here's looking at you, Sweden), have not issued any statements calling for peace and dialogue. That's because such protests against an uncontrollable course of events related to people they have absolutely nothing to do with and living far away, is in the interests of those governments. Rather than refocusing on the needs of their people, they are far happier having the attention diverted elsewhere = as has been the case for decades. Same people who are now protesting over the alleged violation of rights for Palestinians by the mere statement of recognition of an already Jewish portion of Jerusalem with Israeli government in it would not grant Palestinians full citizenship in their own land. (AHEM, Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, etc.) So let's see what's really going on:

1. Either this is not about Trump's statement (because Trump did not explicitly recognize any particular Jerusalem borders), and it's all about Israel not having a right to exist, even including specifically Jewish sites)

or

2. No one actually cares about it just as no one cares about the Palestinians, and people just want to let out their generalized rage at life, but they don't have the freedom to protest their own government, so to make themselves feel better, they pretend to be outraged about some distant cause to which they have little connection. Also, when was the last time Palestinians stood up for their rights to anything? Have Palestinians picked up the human rights issue in Egypt? Have they protested against al-Assad in Syria? Taken an issue with Hizbullah's corruption and control in Lebanon? No? And yet all these people are rioting on their behalf.

So What of the Waiver?

Trump publicly signing the embassy waiver right after his speech is a political move, not a security move.

As I have stated repeatedly in the past, and have yet to be proven wrong, Trump intends to delay the process for the sake of keeping his base, and in particular, funders, and to ensure they will back him against any primary challengers in 2020.

If anything, prolonging this situation will probably result in more security threats. It would be easier to get everything over with at once, and just move the building, get all the riots out of the system and move on. Making this an endless process with an unclear due date will ensure some level of dissatisfaction from everyone concern, and possibly additional riots or other problems whenever the building IS moved.

Reform Jews Are No Shtetl Jews

To call today's left-wing, largely Reform and Conservative Jews, "shtetl Jews" would be a tragic misnomer. I come from shtetl Jews; they are no shtetl Jews. Most shtetl Jews and their offspring, who did not join the Communist party in the Soviet Union, retained a very strong sense of identity if by force, as well as a clear awareness of threats and danger. Those of them who were HOlocaust survivors, in many cases went to Palestine, and fought for the creation of the State of Israel. They did not wait for anyone's permission to do so. Weizmann and the rest, men who came from humble roots, rather than from elitist stock, (Weizmann, a biochemist, came from a village), lobbied President Truman to do the right thing and to recognize the nascent state, in spite of his own State Department, and threats from high level foreign policy officials, which he eventually did.

Violence preceded the creation of the State of Israel, not the least to the spread of propaganda by the Nazis in the Middle East, and ensued once again immediately upon the recognition of Israel as a sovereign state. It then followed the young state through its history, and at each turning point, including the reunification of Jerusalem, there were surely some American Jewish "leaders" who clamored for "sha, shtill!" mentality, claiming that innocent people will die if Israel asserts her rights, and that surely sooner or later the right time will come and Israel can reclaim what's rightfully hers peacefully. My friends, such time will never come.

If you want what's yours, you have to fight for it, sometimes through aggressive lobbying and diplomatic work, and sometimes, upon meeting with blind hatred, corruption, and instigation, with overwhelming force, if that's the only thing your enemy recognizes. Israel is now positioned better than at any time in her history. Many countries find blessing in conducting relations with Israel, and care far more about the advantages such an alliance brings to their people than about empty rhetoric from far-away corrupt politicos, who care nothing about them or their countries and cultures. Let us find courage and wisdom in the lessons of the past, and stand behind President Trump's decision to finally do the right thing that we have been waiting for 70 years, and stop treating ISrael like a pariah among sovereign states by recognizing its own chosen political capital as such. I think it's idiotic to pretend that Israel does not have its entire government in Jerusalem. Being blind to the facts on the ground will not somehow strengthen the claims of the Muslims to the Al Aqsa mosque.

On the contrary, readiness to engage in unprovoked violence against their neighbors, readiness to slaughter civilians to show their displeasure with political moves, weakens their claim of desire for peace, and their claim for spiritual connection with the Holy City. Israel is in a tough neighborhood, where strength, not weakness, is respected and recognized. Saudi Arabia is drawing closer with ISrael not out of desire to protect her, but because she sees ISrael as a strong country, a potentially useful ally against a mutual threat. Don't be under illusion that things would be different if somehow Israel grew softer on any point. The demands would be greater, the violence more intense. Israel should stand up for her basic rights, being treated as an equal among sovereign nations, and the United States should act out of position of strength and pursue an independent foreign policy, based on its own interests, not on empty threats from greedy corrupt illegitimate thugs, who also demand money from US taxpayers to avoid inciting their own abused and manipulated populations towards terrorism and misery.

How Republicans Are Digging Their Own Grave By Being Overly Defensive

(Un)Popular Statement of the day: By defending Flynn on unrelated personal misdeeds, the conservatives helped perpetuate conspiracy theories and false narratives.

Frankly, by ceding moral ground on various issues in the course of last year's elections, Republicans have made both the president and the party as a whole more vulnerable to baseless attacks. Had more of them been willing to stick by issues, while calling out various officials when they warranted it, instead of adopting the head-in-the-sand approach with regards to every accusation from the left, we would not be wasting our money on an investigation into obstruction of justice claims by the Senate Judiciary Committee, and giving free ammunition to Mueller.

This Is How You Lose Big League on Foreign Policy

https://en.dailymail24.com/2017/11/03/this-is-how-you-lose/

Imagine a small country with an insecure government that the past administrations have been supporting, and which has issues that you don't particularly like.

Imagine that this country is a possible ally against a much bigger threat in the region.

What do you do when the bigger threat is courting this country and is promising all sorts of boons with no strings attached?

What's your leverage? Do you engage? Do you give up? Do you continue to stand on principle?

Well, whatever the choices are in this situation, the one thing that is guaranteed not to be helpful is doing absolutely nothing and leaving it up to others to decide how things are going to work.

And that's, of course, precisely what the Trump administration did with Cambodia.

A few months ago, in the wake of the new administration's early forays into foreign policy, regional experts warned about Cambodia moving away from the West towards China, in the run up to the upcoming elections.

Cambodia was worried about losing the elections, and China was offering condition-free loan and political support. Donald Trump, not as interested in pressing for human rights and democracy as some of his predecessors, was, at that point, still an unknown quantity, and could have utilized this opportunity to woo away Cambodia from China by gauging it on other issues. 

For the new administration, it would have been a mistake to rely on the passive continuation of existing foreign relations with even relatively small countries when other countries are actively moving towards engagement in whatever manner.

In bipolar or multipolar circumstances, the smaller countries will engage in maneuvering and play off the superpowers against one another to get the most benefit and influence for themselves. It's a classic Cold War tactic. The mistake the United States was making during the Cold War proxy tensions (and perhaps there were few options at the time) was to be reactive in its approach and merely throw resources as a response. But of course, the Soviet Union would then provide more goodies without any preconditions or expectations of democratization, and so forth.

The better position would have been to a better approach would be to reevaluate various pressure points of Cambodia's foreign policy and to use those pressure points as a more nuanced engagement approach to steer them towards the United States but also make clear that increased engagement with China will not come without a cost. In other words, reverse the position and cause the weak country in question to have to do the cost-benefit analysis of having to choose its allies - or else making the wiser choice, of not being played by China and engaging with both.

That approach very well may have failed. China has no scruples about backing the governments that are loyal and helpful.  And interfering directly in another country's elections is also problematic. But non-interference has not helped us one bit.

Incumbent PM Hun Sen distanced himself from the US, and disregarding all international norms, threw his political opponent in prison.  Earlier engagement may not have stopped this development, but perhaps it could have prevented a complete deterioration of the relationship, and would have allowed us to figure out the leverage for promoting human rights and fair elections. At the very least, we could have taken a more principled stand on this issue before Hun Sen had gone so far in the direction of authoritarianism.

And even after the fact, it is not the President of the United States who has taken an active role in countering this violation of human rights and international norms, but Senator Ted Cruz, who essentially stated that he would work on utilizing the Global Magnitsky Act to deny Cambodian human rights violators entry to the United States. That would, of course, require Congressional pressure on the administration, which has yet to designate human rights violators under that law. At this point, the White House has been put on very public notice, and has no excuse not to take decisive action, including, potentially, sanctions - which is arguably as embarrassing for us, after all the investments we have made into Cambodia, as it is for the Cambodian Prime Minister, who is impolitic reaction to Sen. Cruz's letter was very telling.

However, if US is to be taken seriously, it has no choice but to play an active role in its own relationship, particularly with countries which have been significant recipients of the US taxpayers' money. The US should not have to support corrupt regimes, which have no regard for democracy or freedom, and who are also empowering other dictatorships in order to protect their leadership - but  not their people. And the US should certainly position itself in such a way that other countries should want to do business with it, because an honest relationship with a strong, fair-minded, country respectful of its partners and obligations, and expecting the same should be seen far more reliable and a far better investment than an utterly corrupt and morally bankrupt party leaders, which have been known to renege on its financial promises and will just as easily throw you to the wolves when they no longer have use for you as they back you in time of need.  China has a history of dubious financial investments, which have done little for Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and other countries. It has left projects in Latin America left unmanaged, and has become infamous for the corrupt quality of its project and "investment support"/development, amounting to little more than colonial practices, all over Africa.

Choosing to work with the US should be a no-brainer.  But not if we let China do all the leadership and all the talking, and not if we show we have no interest in strong relationship with clear and coherent rules. I hope this situation wakes President Trump and the State Department to the fact that putting America first means putting in the work needed to forge relationships with our allies, partners, and beneficiaries of our investment that are based on the pursuit of mutual interests and respect. Signalling that we just don't care enough to bother with diplomacy will position us in a very weak place down the road, and one day, we may find that those who do care have taken all initiative and all leverage out of our hand. And that day, who we partner with and on what grounds will no longer be up to us.

Hypocrisy Rules Supreme

You can't argue for universality of human rights and dignity, bash Islamists for promoting child marriages, and for basically treating women like property (except when they are needed for propaganda), and then go and claim that 40 years ago Alabama culture permitted much older men to molest teenage girls (despite the laws to the contrary) and that it's perfectly ok and not at all creepy. If it's creepy when your political opponent does it, it's creepy when your guy does it as well. Just sayin'.

One of the issues that really bothers me about this whole thing with Moore is how easily the public has created double standards. The same religious Christians who are all up an arms for the horrific Islamist cultures that have no regard for women or for individual rights are completely nonchalant about allegations concerning Moore so long as they can score a political victory. Well, if in your cost-benefit analysis, a 2-year Senate seat outweighs any moral considerations, that's certainly up to you, but you will have lost any right to sit in moral judgment of other people and the nasty or blatantly illegal things that they do. And expect me to question the defenders of Moore every time they express outrage about Hollywood pervs who are accused of doing similar things, which are likewise from long ago and at this point, unprovable. No, I don't expect politicians to be saints. I do expect their supporters to have enough intellectual honesty to hold themselves to the same standards they expect of their opposition.

How To Fight The Excesses of Trumpism

Two things about Trump's Muslim video tweets:

Regardless, of what you think about their value, or Britain First, it's obvious that the man is just not going to stop. Y'all wasting your time. Why? Because he knows his supporters like it, and also are sick of politically correct garbage, when you are not allowed to open your mouth without being called an Islamophobes and have your legitimate concerns dismissed.

And populists take easy advantage of such grievances, and of course, take their new found freedom from PC all the way the other end. Don't like it? Start giving platforms to serious thinkers who can discuss Islamism without hysterics, and stop empowering the likes of Linda Sarsour. The more you attack Trump and ask him to stop, the more he will continue in the same vein just to piss people off, and the more his hardcore supporters will applaud him.

Second, the non-profits who are choosing to engage in Twitter wars with the President are not saving the country from White Supremacists. They are begging for money from their donors.

Start supporting people who are willing to discuss reasonable solutions, and you won't have room for demagogues, who have nothing to offer but bloviations that cater to emotions and fears.

But you won't see that happening, because non-profits need money and they can only get money if they fighting some grievance.

How to Preempt Republican Primary Challengers in 2020

Prediction: Every time Sheldon Adelson shows displeasure with Steve Bannon, or someone linked to Trump, or Republicans, Mike Pence, or someone from the administration will renew the promise of moving the Embassy to Jerusalem. The words "actively considering" without any specific date will reappear at some appropriate event. Meanwhile, we'll be no closer to any action than at the beginning of the presidency. Works every time. Like clockwork.

Simple Rules for Sexual Harassment Claims

To those who are now gloating about Mike Pence's position on never having one-on-one dinner with women who are not his wife - that's his personal business, and I respect his position, but I do NOT want the United States turn into a cultural theocracy with Biblical laws being enforced for every interaction between the sexes. I'd rather risk being sexually harassed. That said, to guard people's reputations, the following guidelines should be ensured:

Any reporting of alleged harassment should be reported within a reasonable period of time (i.e. a few days), regardless of victim's age. If it's not reported within that time period, the victim automatically is assumed to be lying. Every reported incident should be investigated, but if there is no evidence to support what happened, the target of the probe should be publicly cleared.

And people of all backgrounds, ages, and both sexes should assume common sense when interacting with each other. Unless you think your advances are going to be welcomed (i.e. if you are in a relationship), leave the other person alone! Also, there is a difference between an unwelcome but not forceful advance, that stops as soon as the woman says no, or shows displeasure, and demanding sexual favors in return for a job. And if you are drunk and then change your mind later, that should absolutely count against you. Don't be so passed out drunk that you can be taken advantage of or that your judgment is so impaired that you make decisions you otherwise wouldn't. There is no reason why society or anyone else should be held responsible for your stupidity.

What Does the Left Get Out of the Roy Moore Fiasco?

Ladies and gents, I bring to you the very obvious outcome of the left's efforts in handing the Ray Moore story.

The issue for the left is not whether Moore is guilty or innocent.

Not whether they will win or lose that one seat (that's not under anyone's direct control).

Not whether, he'll keep on fighting or leave the race. All those are factors, not central issues.

The central issue here is dividing and ridiculing the Republican party, having Republicans go at one and other, and discrediting themselves in a wide variety of ways.

So far, the plan is succeeding.

When You Think You Are Strong, When In Fact, You're Just SHort-Sighted

Democrats are ALWAYS trying to do hit jobs. That's called opposition research. Sometimes it bears out and sometimes it's pure fabrication. That's nasty, but it's politics so there is no excuse not to be prepared and not do your own job in looking at where your candidate might get hit.

And do all of you honestly believe that the Republicans woudn't do oppo research on a candidate and try to bring it up at a convenient time if they could? The better question is why are they so terrible at doing that. Is it laziness? Weakness? Corruption? Lack of access to quality operatives? I don't know. What I do firmly believe that all the people who are more than willing to overlook whatever Roy Moore did just because the Democrats brought it out of the closet at the last minute would do the same thing to the other side in the heartbeat, if only they could. But they can't, so they are doing their party a disservice twice: first, by talking the talk without walking the walk, and second, by failing to distance themselves from known liabilities and therefore opening themselves up to further attacks of the same kind.

I won't be surprised if more of this doesn't come out in a week or two, only much worse and with some awful evidence that will be hard to dispute.

Let's face it, 40 years ago, people did not keep good records. They weren't in the habit of instagramming their every move. There was no Instagram. 20 years from now? The young candidates running in local elections will be inundated with blackmail and revelations. And if we are still stuck in the mindset from 40 years ago 20 years from now, there won't be any elections worth winning left.

Stuck in the Middle With You... Oh wait.

Snowflakes to the left of me and snowflakes to the right...

OK, first of all I'm in New York, and there IS no one to the right of me.

Second, winter IS coming...

Third: with the ascent of Donald J.Trump, the words like "left" and "right" don't mean anything. Oh well.

Carry on then, and drink some covfefe.... just not from a Keurig.

Roy Moore's Defense Starts With Roy Moore

1. Roy Moore failed to publicly and unequivocally deny all allegations, including but not limited to accusations of attempted sexual assault, being banned from the mall for being too creepy even for that time and place, and the yearbook.

2. If in doubt, see one. I see no reason to defend someone who refuses to defend himself. Why are you killing yourselves and making yourselves look ridiculous over someone who refuses to simply state "There is not one word of truth in any of this"?

Roy Moore is Not The Hill Worth Dying On

Let me put it this way, whatever you think of cultural norms in Alabama 40 years ago, the bulk of the evidence, Moore's guilt or innocences, who is behind the current revelations, and whether or not it's appropriate to run such candidates, one thing is clear to me:

Moore is not entitled to support of anyone except the people who voted for him. No politician from another jurisdiction "has" to continue supporting somebody with a cloud of attempted sexual assault allegations hanging over his head. And not one conservative must act against his conscience and show support to somebody from another state just to virtue signal their opposition to dirty trickery by the Democrats. And if the v oters in Alabama decide that this guy deserves to be in the Senate, so be it. But he is not entitled to a single colleague's support there if they in good conscience believe that he is a liar and a pervert.

And if he continues tarnishing the brand of the Republican Party, the people who are vigorously supporting him now will have that to content with. If the Party continues to fail to recruit new people because GOP becomes associated with hypocrisy, complete lack of accountability, and lack of good judgment, Republicans will have only themselves to blame. There are many battles to fight against the left. Some Republicans were willing to hang themselves on the hill that was Michael Flynn. We all know how that turned out. Sometimes it's just not worth it, morally or practically. I am not willing to tie my personal reputation to Roy MOore, whom I didn't actually support to begin with, except in a very technical sense as the voters' choice for the general election in Alabama. And the PR winner in this battle is going to be the left anyway. By all means, expose dirty trickery wherever you see it - but only after making sure that you yourself are not going down with the people you are exposing.

Just The Facts, Ma'am

I don't see anyone debating or discrediting the testimony that Moore was banned from the mall in his town for being creepy. Either that is an objective fact, independent of any character witnesses, or it's not. Either he was banned or he wasn't. Should be easy enough to figure out for those who are willing to do so, instead of going in circles debating who would have or should have known what.

Why You Don't Have To Support Moore to Be a Real Conservative

It's astounding to see the very same people (literally) who expressed horror at Donald Trump's character last year, and were distressed that the Republicans chose him as their nominee in the primaries, and were shocked that the Evangelicals and other religious groups would endorse someone like that, the same people who refused to give him full-hearted support even after the nomination... suddenly defend Roy Moore with their dying breath AS IF THERE IS NO CAUSE FOR CONCERN whatsoever.

Now, don't get me wrong. I've been struggling with this issue myself since the story broke out. Unlike many of Moore's supporters, I never liked the man to begin with, but since this is the candidate Alabama voters have chosen, I was hoping, and could certainly understand, that Moore's conservative colleagues in the Senate would try to make the best of the situation, buddy up with him, and get him to vote for the right things and avoid saying and doing harmful things as much as possible. I would not be happy that he was there at all, but I could live with that outcome. I cannot live with a liar, who makes fools of his own constituents, and who appears to be completely non-chalant about the seriousness of the accusations by his detractors. I will be significantly less diplomatic about it than some people I very much respect were and say as following: sure, the timing MAY very well be entirely political and disruptive. But that does not justify Moore's crimes, if he is guilty of them, and it's certainly does not justify the lying.

And it absolutely does not justify those "conservatives" who are willing to put aside all moral judgment and support Moore EVEN if it turns out that all claims are true and he is indeed a pedophile and a liar. To say that I'm disappointed, not so much in the original Trump supporters, but in the people who did consider character an important issue to selecting a candidate and who now completely destroyed their credibility by trying to find excuses for the inexcusable, is not to say anything. I've already seen a fair number sliding down that slippery slope into blatantly favoring evil, not even the lesser evil, just evil, so long as it's "their" kind of evil, and this further degradation just adds an additional layer of disgust on top of it all. Now, I get if people are genuinely struggling with this issue. I myself expressed grave concerns about the high likelihood of defamation of character, conveniently launched by political operatives and picked up by those who simply dislike Moore.

For that reason, I have a great deal of respect for Steve Deace, who, in a very earnest statement, explained why he himself is struggling with this issue. I myself was not willing to "buy into" (as I was accused of doing) the political machinery behind the latest election-time shenanigans. I wanted to see what would happen next. I was sorely disappointed by Roy Moore's own actions, his loss of credibility on Hannity, and by the bandwagon of apologists, who do not care about truth, righteousness, or even legality of his actions, so long as he "wins" and they get to score points against the left. Once again, my advice to the conservatives: the road to hell is paved with good intentions. You might want to reconsider your own choices that keep leading you towards increasingly more impeachable candidates. There is no shortage of staunch conservatives without this kind of baggage. How about, instead of falling for the most shrill, grandiose megalomaniacs that you can find, supporting people with no dark secrets of the sexual crime variety, who will do their job earnestly, and who will not blatantly lie to you about the most basic facts of the situation?

I am further disgusted by the accusations of bad faith and being a tool of the left that are being launched at me now that after a time of carefully monitoring the situation and struggling with various angles of it, i have come to a personal choice that Moore is more likely guilty than not, and that he is almost certainly lying about at least some aspects of this situation. I took heat from the left when I cautioned against jumping at easy political bait and at the gravity of undermining someone's reputation. I am equally willing to take the heat now, because truth to me, matters a lot more than opinions of people on the Internet. I am not willing to make compromises with my own conscience and to support someone who engages in this level of deceit and is either covering up a crime, or is so narcissistic, that even for the sake of clearing his name and helping his party dig itself out of the moral morass, will continue covering up, lying, and equivocating.

I pray and wholeheartedly hope that Moore turns out to be entirely innocent of the heinous accusations against him. However, he disgraced himself on Hannity, and he disgraced himself further by refusing to clear his name and by not calling out to his supporters and cautioning them against their willingness to support criminals. That would have been the right thing to do in this situation. Unlike the many "conservatives" I have encountered, I remain fully confident that the State of Alabama, has, in fact, a number of viable, conservative candidates, who are neither pedophiles nor liars or equivocators, and who would make fine candidates in the event Roy Moore wisely decides to spare us all additional embarrassment and to withdraw. He is now a complete liability to the party, and the best he can do is come clear, apologize, and take his leave. If he stays in the race, somehow manages to win the election (which I doubt), and takes the Senate seat, he will have not only disgraced that institution, but he will be a political loss for conservatives. His vote will be tainted, and he will end up as disservice to his own state.