Teammates put peanuts in allergic student’s locker. School district says it wasn’t bullying

 https://thehill.com/changing-america/enrichment/education/4458224-teammates-put-peanuts-in-allergic-students-locker-school-district-says-it-wasnt-bullying/

More than a month later, Mannon stood before the Lake Travis school board in November. She was livid. The kids responsible were disciplined, but she expected it to be to a different level. They were benched from some football games. She was told the district’s athletic director and head football coach were determining the discipline. 

The district said it worked with other law enforcement agencies and consulted the assistant district attorney’s office, but ultimately, the school district’s police department decided criminal charges were not warranted. 

RAV AVIGDOR MILLER ON ENJOYING EVERYTHING

 https://torasavigdor.org/qa/rav-avigdor-miller-on-enjoying-everything/

Q:

What is meant by the statement in the Gemara (Yerushalmi Kiddushin 12:4) that a person is going to have to give an accounting in the Next World for everything that he saw in this world and didn’t utilize for pleasure?

Cohen marrying giyores

 

The Warped Electoral Logic Behind Trump’s Antisemitism

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/12/07/electoral-logic-behind-trumps-antisemitism-00072661 

In October, when Trump complained about ungrateful Jews, there was little or no pushback from Republicans.

After Ye tweeted that he was “going death con3 on JEWISH people,” the former president invited him to dinner. He came with a notorious neo-Nazi.

And, once again, Trump offered no apology. He doesn’t think he has to, because his base doesn’t mind. These are his people. And he needs them.

Trump says loss caused by her refusal to respect him

 https://www.newsweek.com/democrat-tom-suozzi-wins-new-york-special-election-ap-projects-1869531

Former President Donald Trump lashed out at Pilip over her loss, referring to her as a "very foolish woman" in a post on his Truth Social platform around 11:20 p.m. on Tuesday. In the social media post, the MAGA leader decried the loss and said the Republican candidate would have won had she treated MAGA with respect.

"Republicans just don't learn, but maybe she was still a Democrat? I have an almost 99% Endorsement Success Rate in Primaries, and a very good number in the General Elections, as well, but just watched this very foolish woman, Mazi Melesa Pilip, running in a race where she didn't endorse me and tried to 'straddle the fence,' when she would have easily WON if she understood anything about MODERN DAY politics in America," Trump said in the Truth Social post. "MAGA, WHICH IS MOST OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY, STAYED HOME - AND IT ALWAYS WILL, UNLESS IT IS TREATED WITH THE RESPECT THAT IT DESERVES. I STAYED OUT OF THE RACE, 'I WANT TO BE LOVED!' GIVE US A REAL CANDIDATE IN THE DISTRICT FOR NOVEMBER. SUOZZI, I KNOW HIM WELL, CAN BE EASILY BEATEN!"

Democrat Tom Suozzi wins New York special election, will replace George Santos

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/385173

Democrat Tom Suozzi on Tuesday won a special election in New York for the US House seat that was left vacant when Republican George Santos was expelled from Congress, The Associated Press reported.

Suozzi defeated Republican candidate Mazi Pilip, an American Israeli woman who was born in Ethiopia and who was brought to Israel in 1991 during Israel’s “Operation Solomon”.

With the win, he retakes a seat he held for three terms before giving it up to run, unsuccessfully, for governor.

The victory narrows the slim Republican majority in the House and gives Democrats a much-needed win in New York City’s Long Island suburbs.

Raskin razzes Stefanik for ‘evasive and embarrassing answers’ on antisemitism

 https://thehill.com/homenews/house/4356577-raskin-razzes-stefanik-for-evasive-and-embarrassing-answers-on-antisemitism/

Raskin posed to Stefanik “five easy questions for you to address with ‘moral clarity’ on presidential tolerance for — and embrace of — antisemitism … Please avoid the waffling evasion you rightfully denounced!”

Raskin listed four examples of moments when Trump engaged in activity that some have labeled antisemitic and asked whether Stefanik would support a candidate engaged in such behavior. A fifth question asked whether she was prepared to denounce the antisemitic “Great Replacement Theory” linked to several mass shootings.

In response to an MSNBC interview in which Raskin made a similar point, Stefanik wrote on X, “Thanks for asking @jamie_raskin, the answer is simple: President Trump was the best friend Jewish people have had in the White House in modern times,” Stefanik wrote Monday afternoon on X.

Raskin asks how Stefanik can question anyone about antisemitism when she supports Trump

 https://thehill.com/homenews/house/4353409-raskin-stefanik-antisemitism-support-trump/

“Where does Elise Stefanik get off lecturing anybody about antisemitism, when she’s the hugest supporter of Donald Trump, who traffics in antisemitism all the time?” Raskin asked during an interview with MSNBC’s Ali Velshi.

“She didn’t utter a peep of protest when he had Kanye West and Nick Fuentes over for dinner,” Raskin said. “Nick Fuentes, who doubts whether Oct. 7 even took place because he thinks it was some kind of suspicious propaganda move by the Israelis.

“The Republican Party is filled with people who are entangled with antisemitism like that,” Raskin added, “and yet somehow she gets on our high horse and lectures a Jewish college president from MIT.”

‘She scares me’: Stefanik’s emergence as Trump’s cheerleader sparks criticism

 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/jan/30/elise-stefanik-trump-republican-election

In her early House years, Stefanik was widely deemed a moderate, but she has pivoted hard right to help Trump since his loss in 2020 when she joined 146 other House members who opposed certifying the election results.

Poverty is desirable

 Rabbeinu Bachya (Kad HaKemach Wealth 1:3) Because of the great harm that comes with wealth and for the many terrible troubles that arise from it, the sages praised the reverse which  is poverty, as they taught in Chagiga that Eliyahu said G-d did not find a solution for Israel, to be saved from sin, but poverty, The custom of the wealthy is that everyone who accumulates a little of it will long for more, and another who accumulates a lot of it will lust for multiples and will never be satisfied because he will never be satisfied

Chagigah (9b) Elijah said to Bar He-He, and others say, to R. Eleazar: What is the meaning of the verse: Behold I have refined thee but not as silver; I have tried thee in the furnace of affliction? It teaches that G-d went through all the good qualities in order to give them to Israel, and He found only poverty

Eruvin (41b) Three matters cause a person to act against his own will and the will of his Maker, and they are: Gentiles, and an evil spirit, and the depths of extreme poverty. What is the practical halakhic difference that emerges from this statement? It is significant as it teaches one to request mercy for people who suffer from those…

Avoda Zara (5a) Four kinds of persons may be regarded as dead, they are: the poor, the blind, the leprous, and the childless.

Nedarim (64b) Four are accounted as dead: A poor man, a leper, a blind person, and one who is childless

Mishlei (30:07-09)  Two things have I asked of you; do not deny them before I die; 8. Remove far from me falsehood and lies; do not give me poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that is needful for me;9. Lest I be full, and deny you, and say, Who is the Lord? or lest I be poor, and steal, and profane the name of my G-d.

A ‘whale’ of a tale: Trump continues to distort cognitive test he took

 https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/01/19/trump-cognitive-test/

“I think it was 35, 30 questions,” the former president said in Portsmouth, N.H., of the test, which he said involved a few animal identification queries. “They always show you the first one, like a giraffe, a tiger, or this, or that — a whale. ‘Which one is the whale?’ Okay. And that goes on for three or four [questions] and then it gets harder and harder and harder.”

The only problem: The creator of the test in question, called the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, or MoCA, said it has never included the specific combination of animals described by Trump in any of its versions over the years.

CNN Doctor Trolls Trump Over 'Dementia' Boast With 1 Simple Sentence

 https://news.yahoo.com/cnn-doctor-trolls-trump-over-045944368.html

“If you think a dementia screening test is very difficult, you may have early dementia,” Reiner, who is director of cardiac catheterization laboratories at George Washington University, wrote on X:

The test was created to help doctors detect the warning signs of the cognitive impairments that can lead to dementia.

“It is supposed to be easy for someone who has no cognitive impairment,” Dr. Ziad Nasreddine, who developed the test, told MarketWatch in 2020.

Yet Trump has constantly claimed otherwise.

Stop Talking About Biden's Mental Acuity. Start Talking About Trump's Signs of Dementia

 https://www.newsweek.com/stop-talking-about-bidens-mental-acuity-start-talking-about-trumps-signs-dementia-opinion-1853741

The most telling evidence of Trump's growing dementia is found in his paranoid thirst for revenge, on which he is now centering his entire campaign. On November 11, he pledged to a crowd of supporters in Claremont, New Hampshire, that, "We will root out the communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country, that lie and steal and cheat on elections and will do anything possible—they'll do anything, whether legally or illegally, to destroy America and to destroy the American dream."

No, thanks, Mr. President: Special election candidates shun Biden and Trump

 https://www.politico.com/news/2024/02/13/biden-trump-new-york-house-race-00141076

The strategic decision by the two candidates in the nail-biter race underscores the dissatisfaction Americans have with the elderly men likely to capture the two major party nominations this year. Both have high negatives and intractable problems for swing voters like those going to the polls on Tuesday: Biden would be 86 when his term ends and has been pilloried by the right and far left for his handling of the southern border crisis. Trump, meanwhile, continues to deny he lost the election in 2020 and is facing 91 felony charges.