Trump Fires Inspector General Investigating Pompeo

Dems, Republicans disagree with Defense Sec. call to withdraw from Sinai

https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/dems-republicans-disagree-with-defense-sec-call-to-withdraw-from-sinai-628401

Twelve lawmakers representing key Senate and House of Representatives committees called for continued U.S. support of the international peacekeeping force in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.

Esper reportedly has been pushing for the withdrawal of American troops from the U.S.-led force, despite opposition from Israel and the U.S. State Department. He has called for the withdrawal as a cost-cutting measure and because the soldiers are at increased risk.

Litzman: There was an overreaction on coronavirus

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/280391

Outgoing Health Minister Yaakov Litzman said on Sunday that he, too, thought there was an overreaction when preparing for the coronavirus outbreak.

Speaking in an interview on Reshet Bet radio, Litzman claimed that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu "responded to the fears of the Director-General of the Ministry of Health, Moshe Bar Siman Tov."

"I, too, thought it was an overreaction when my Director-General said there could be ten thousand dead. I shouted during the government meeting, in his presence, that it would not happen. The Prime Minister accepted this exaggeration and responded to the fears of the Director-General, I am not complaining about him, because overall the situation is excellent.”

 

Low-Tech Way to Help Some Covid Patients: Flip Them Over

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/13/health/coronavirus-proning-lungs.html?algo=identity&fellback=false&imp_id=680516836&imp_id=36060187&action=click&module=Science%20%20Technology&pgtype=Homepage

Turning ventilated patients onto their stomachs, called proning, helps them by opening their lungs. Now doctors are testing to see if it can keep others off ventilators altogether.

 

Eric Trump says Democrats 'trying to milk' coronavirus shutdown, media 'stoking fear'

https://www.foxnews.com/media/eric-trump-says-democrats-trying-to-milk-coronavirus-shutdown-media-stoking-fear

 

The Democrats are "trying to milk" the coronavirus pandemic for every election advantage they can get over President Trump, the president's son, Eric Trump, said Saturday night.

"It's sad," Trump told Fox News host Jeanine Pirro on "Justice with Judge Jeanine." "My father as commander-in-chief has one of the hardest decisions I think any president in history has had," regarding whether to reopen the U.S. economy, and to what extent, Trump said.

"You have to weigh the safety of the public versus, you know, our economy and opening up America," he explained. "We are the economic powerhouse of the entire world, Jeanine. And, you know, he's got to weigh that. But America does have to get back to work and Americans also want to get back to work."

Eric Trump Claims Social Distancing Is a Democrat 'Strategy' and COVID-19 Will 'Magically' Disappear After Election

hps://time.com/5838104/eric-trump-coronavirus-disappear/

In an interview with Fox News’ Jeanine Pirro on Saturday, the President’s son cast doubt on social distancing measures aimed at curbing the spread of coronavirus, which has claimed the lives of more than 89,000 Americans. Trump declared that Democrats are “trying to milk” the pandemic by temporarily closing businesses and implementing other social distancing measures, and that they aim to undermine President Donald Trump’s ability to win reelection.

 

For COVID-19 patients, life after ventilators plagued with challenges

https://www.jpost.com/health-science/road-to-recovery-plagued-with-challenges-for-covid-19-patients-628370

Ventilated patients can lose their independent capacity to breathe. Some people are presenting with small blood clots.

Most COVID-19 patients who are placed on a mechanical ventilator do not survive, according to a study published by the Journal of the American Medical Association. However, for those who do, the road to recovery is much longer than one might expect.

Trump's turn to the economy leaves a vacuum when it comes to controlling the pandemic

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/17/politics/president-donald-trump-leadership-covid/index.html

 Publicly and privately, Sen. Angus King spent weeks seeking a national coronavirus testing plan. Sen. Lamar Alexander held a hearing where President Donald Trump's testing czar Brett Giroir acknowledged his efforts remain "a work in progress."

Trump has brushed off all three -- a Democratic-aligned independent from Maine, a Republican from Tennessee, an admiral he appointed. He calls testing "overrated" while asserting, nonsensically, that more tests merely inflate the number of coronavirus cases.

"An astonishing failure of competent leadership," King concluded in an interview with CNN. And it's one that demonstrates a jarring reality of America's fight against the global pandemic.

After briefly embracing the role of "wartime President," Trump has all but quit the battlefield in favor of cheerleading for economic revival. In the absence of reliable White House leadership, a haphazard combination of federal, state and private sector efforts has gradually boosted testing levels even without a national plan.

 

The decline in the proportion of positive tests points toward an ebb-tide for the pandemic nationally. Yet public health officials warn that the commander-in-chief's retreat on halting the virus now threatens to slow or reverse progress that the painful stay-at-home measures and economic shutdown have bought. The British medical journal The Lancet denounced the Trump administration as "obsessed with magic bullets" such as vaccines, while remaining "nowhere near" the level of testing the fight requires.

Judge Sullivan trumps Bill Barr.

Defying health orders, Israelis flock to beaches amid heatwave

https://www.ynetnews.com/article/rJ3V0rC9U

Although beaches set to officially reopen only on Wednesday, thousands of beachgoers could be seen sunbathing and swimming in the sea over the weekend, despite restrictions meant to combat COVID-19; police, inspectors fail to enforce health rules

 

Coronavirus doctor's diary: A super-spreading funeral that led to three deaths

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-52678750

In March, before the lockdown began, the Hussain family held a big funeral in Bradford's central mosque. Tragically, many mourners fell ill with Covid-19, including the dead man's son, Mohammed. But while three family members died, Mohammed eventually pulled through, writes Dr John Wright of the Bradford Royal Infirmary.

Trump Jr. hits Howard Stern for going 'establishment,' 'acting like Hillary'

https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/497802-trump-jr-hits-howard-stern-for-going-establishment-acting-like

During his SiriusXM show on Wednesday, Stern said the president should step down amid the coronavirus pandemic, saying, “I do think it would be extremely patriotic of Donald to say, ‘I’m in over my head, and I don’t want to be president anymore.'”
He also claimed on his show that the president despised his supporters and would be “disgusted by them.”

“The oddity in all of this is the people Trump despises most, love him the most,” Stern, who would often feature Trump on his show prior to his run for office, said. “The people who are voting for Trump, for the most part ... he wouldn’t even let them in a f---ing hotel. He’d be disgusted by them. Go to Mar-a-Lago, see if there’s any people who look like you. I’m talking to you in the audience.”

 

“There couldn’t be anything further from the truth," Trump Jr. added in reference to Stern's comments in the interview. "If you speak with Donald Trump, you talk to him and you sit down with him and talk about sports or whatever it is, you’ll see what I’ve always called him, which is he’s sort of the blue-collar billionaire."

Trump Says a Sitting President Can't Be Investigated. Will the Supreme Court Tell Him He's Wrong? | Opinion

https://www.newsweek.com/trump-says-sitting-president-cant-investigated-will-supreme-court-tell-him-hes-wrong-1504211

 

The rules of federal governance are being dramatically reconceived under the presidency of Donald Trump. The president's traditional relationship with federal agencies, with Congress and with state governments are all being called into question. At no time, however, in the past three and a half years has the radical nature of the "Constitution according to Trump" been more apparent than on Tuesday, when the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in two cases addressing whether the Constitution permits either Congress or a state district attorney to subpoena the president's tax returns from his accountants, Mazars.

What would it mean for the Supreme Court to side with Trump in the case of congressional subpoenas? Congress would effectively lose the ability to investigate the president. They could try to investigate him, but since they could not subpoena him or any of his financial records, even from third parties, such an investigation would be futile. This is the same theory, by the way, that White House lawyers used in the D.C. Circuit to argue that former White House Counsel Don McGahn could not be forced to testify before the House Judiciary Committee in response to its subpoena issued during the impeachment proceedings. Consider how differently those proceedings might have gone had the president not obstructed his testimony.

Shushvin - what is it?

Berachos (61a) And he brought her to the man.21 R. Jeremiah b. Eleazar said: This teaches that [God] acted as shushvin(best man) to Adam. Here the Torah teaches a maxim of behaviour, that a man of eminence should associate himself with a lesser man in acting as best man, and he should not take it amiss.

It is also translated as bridesmaid. but the gemora also describes it as bridal loans

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[1] רמב"ם הלכות זכיה ומתנה פרק ז הלכה א

מנהג פשוט ברוב המדינות שבזמן שישא אדם אשה משלחין לו ריעיו ומיודעיו מעות כדי שיתחזק בהן על ההוצאה שמוציא באשתו ובאים אותן הריעים והמיודעים ששלחו לו ואוכלין ושותין עם החתן בשבעת ימי המשתה או במקצתן, הכל כמנהג המדינה, ואלו המעות שמשלחין נקראין שושבינות, ואותם ששלחו המעות ואוכלין ושותין עם החתן נקראים שושבינין.

[2] רמב"ם הלכות זכיה ומתנה פרק ז הלכה ב

השושבינות אינה מתנה גמורה, הדברים ידועים שלא שלח זה עשרה דינרין בשביל שיאכל וישתה בזה ולא שלח אלא מפני שבדעתו היה שאם ישא הוא אשה יחזור וישלח לו כמו ששלח לו, לפיכך אם נשא זה אשה ולא החזיר לו השושבינות הרי זה תובעו בדין ומוציא ממנו.

[3] רמב"ם הלכות זכיה ומתנה פרק ז הלכה ג

ואין יכול לתבעו עד שישא כדרך שנשא הוא, כיצד ראובן שנשא בתולה ושלח לו שמעון שושבינות ואח"כ נשא שמעון אלמנה, אינו יכול לתבוע להחזיר לו השושבינות שהרי אומר לו איני מחזיר לך אלא בבתולה כמו שנתת לי, וכן אם שלח לו בנשואי אלמנה אינו יכול לתובעו להחזיר לו בנשואי בתולה.