Thursday, January 20, 2022

Supreme Court ruling is a bitter legal and personal blow to Trump

 https://edition.cnn.com/2022/01/20/politics/donald-trump-supreme-court-january-6-committee/index.html

There is no doubt, however, that Trump will be apoplectic that his three Supreme Court nominees, Justices Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett, did not publicly dissent from denying his bid to keep his West Wing records secret. Trump has repeatedly slammed the Supreme Court for throwing out his false claims of election fraud, claiming he was a victim of a miscarriage of justice even though his delusional cases were also dismissed by multiple lower courts. Even before the election in 2020, the then-President had said it was important to quickly confirm Barrett so that she could be in place to vote on any election disputes.

Supreme Court clears the way for House to get Trump White House documents

 https://edition.cnn.com/2022/01/19/politics/supreme-court-trump-white-house-docs/index.html

The Supreme Court cleared the way Wednesday for the release of presidential records from the Trump White House to a congressional committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol.
The court's order means that more than 700 documents will be transferred to Congress that could shed light on the events leading up to the insurrection when hundreds of rioters converged on the Capitol attempting to stop certification of the 2020 presidential election results.
Only Justice Clarence Thomas said publicly that he would have granted former President Donald Trump's request to block the document handover from the National Archives to the House select committee. No other justices made an objection public.

Wednesday, January 19, 2022

Don Lemon SLAMS Unvaxxed As "Idiots," Laura Ingraham MOCKS Gen. Milley Over COVID Diagnosis

When the Delta variant dominated, vaccination and prior infection protected against Covid-19, but vaccination was safest, study finds

 https://edition.cnn.com/2022/01/19/health/covid-vaccine-infection-protection-cdc-study/index.html

"Together, the totality of the evidence suggests really that both vaccination and having survived Covid each provide protection against subsequent reinfection, infection and hospitalization," said Dr. Eli Rosenberg, New York state deputy director for science. "Having Covid the first time carries with it significant risks, and becoming vaccinated and staying up-to-date with boosters really is the only safe choice for preventing COVID infection and severe disease."
"If a person who's had natural Covid then gets vaccinated, they have levels of antibody that are much, much higher than after the natural infection itself. And what we know about higher levels of antibody is: one, you usually get a longer duration of protection, and number two, the variety of antibodies that your immune system produces is more diverse. The notion is that you will be better protected against a diversity of variants," said Schaffner, who is a vaccine adviser to the CDC, but was not involved in the study.

Boeing Takes Hit as Its 777, 787 Planes Appear Susceptible to 5G Network

 https://www.newsweek.com/boeing-takes-hit-its-777-787-planes-appear-susceptible-5g-network-1670782

Boeing faces a setback as its 777 and 787 planes used by airlines worldwide are particularly susceptible to the new 5G network signals as the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) announced safety concerns.

The FAA said the new 5G signals could interfere with the Boeing 787's and 777's airplanes systems using radio altimeters, which indicate how far a plane is off the ground while in the air, according to a statement Friday.

Altimeters data are used in several systems such as for engines, flight controls, traffic alert, collision avoidance, ground proximity warning, autopilot systems, and detecting dangerous wind shears.

Airlines are concerned because altimeters operate in the 4.2-4.4 GHz range, and the 5G frequencies would operate too close to the same range and affect airplane instruments, Reuters reported.

הממשלה מאשרת שוב את חוק הגיוס שנפל

 https://www.kikar.co.il/410490.html

הגנץ לוקח סיכון: פחות מ-48 שעות אחרי נפילת חוק הגיוס במליאת הכנסת, שר הביטחון בני גנץ לחץ והיום (רביעי) הממשלה מאשרת את חוק הגיוס מחדש לקראת הצבעה חוזרת על החוק בהמשך.
אחרי שהחוק יאושר לא יהיה צורך בישיבת ממשלה או בוועדת שרים לענייני חקירה, אלא החוק יונח ישירות על שולחן הכנסת.
כזכור, ביום שני האחרון נפל חוק הגיוס של שר הביטחון בני גנץ, לאחר שחברת הכנסת ג'ידא רחנאווי זועבי ממר"צ הפרה את המשמעת הקואליציונית והצביעה נגד חוק החוק ובמקביל חברי הכנסת מאזן גנאיים ועמיחי שיקלי נעדרו מההצבעה.

Gantz Resubmits Draft Law; Set to Pass Next Week

 https://hamodia.com/2022/01/19/gantz-resubmits-draft-law-set-to-pass-next-week/

Ahead of the vote in the Knesset plenum, pressure is expected to be placed on the MKs of the Ra’am party, one of whom abstained from voting on Monday, and also on MK Ghaida Rinawie Zoabi of Meretz, who opposed the bill in Monday’s vote, resulting in the bill failing to pass. The coalition believes that Zoabi will support the proposal this time around.

The vote on Monday ended in a 54:54 tie after MK Zoabi violated coalition discipline and voted against the law. MKs Mazen Ghanaim (Ra’am) and Amichai Chikli (Yamina) were absent from the vote.

Freed Hostage Rabbi Demanded Israel Drop Sovereignty Plans in the Settlements

 https://www.jewishpress.com/news/jewish-news/freed-hostage-rabbi-demanded-israel-drop-sovereignty-plans-in-the-settlements/2022/01/16/

In the world of "you can't make this stuff up"... This is my old synagogue, I left due to a few issues, first, the Rabbi called Israel an apartheid state against Islam, and a second, he didn't allow his members (including myself) to be armed during services. Now he is held hostage by a Muslim man with a gun...

Singer Hana Horká Dies of COVID After Catching It on Purpose To Avoid Vaccine

 https://www.newsweek.com/singer-hana-horka-dies-covid-after-catching-purpose-avoid-vaccine-1670675

Hana Horká, who was the vocalist for the long-running folk band Asonance, passed away on Sunday at the age of 57, AFP reported, citing her son Jan Rek.

Rek told Czech public radio iRozhlas.cz that his mother had voluntarily exposed herself to the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes COVID-19, in order to obtain a health pass that would have allowed her to visit the sauna and theater.

Israeli police evict Palestinian family in East Jerusalem neighborhood

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

Israeli police evicted a Palestinian family from their home in the flashpoint East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah on Wednesday, demolishing the dwelling in a case that has drawn international attention.

Police had withdrawn after the standoff on Monday but returned before dawn on Wednesday, saying in a statement it was enforcing a court-approved eviction order of "illegal buildings built on grounds designated for a school for children with special needs".

In a joint statement with the Jerusalem municipality, police said several people were arrested for questioning on suspicion of violating a court order and disturbing the peace. Witnesses said some 25 Palestinians, including five family members, were detained.

Elderly man suspected of sexual abuse is arrested

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/320753

A Jerusalem resident in his 70s has been arrested on suspicion of sexually abusing two people, Maariv reported.

According to the report, the individual is suspected of sexually abusing minors in separate instances, which occurred several years ago.

The individual, who is well-respected and considered to be a hasidic leader, carried out sex crimes against a minor female family member, as well as against a minor male.

Calling Omicron ‘Mild’ Is Wishful Thinking

 https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2022/01/omicron-mild-severity-immunity/621238/

For weeks, the watchword on Omicron in much of America has been some form of phew. A flurry of reports has encouraged a relatively rosy view of the variant, compared with some of its predecessors. Omicron appears to somewhat spare the lungs. Infected laboratory mice and hamsters seem to handily fight it off. Proportionally, fewer of the people who catch it wind up hospitalized or dead. All of this has allowed a deceptively reassuring narrative to take root and grow: Omicron is mild. The variant is docile, harmless, the cause of an #Omicold that’s no worse than a fleeting flu. It is so trivial, some have argued, that the world should simply “allow this mild infection to circulate,” and avoid slowing the spread. Omicron, as Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky would have you believe, is “basically nature’s vaccine.”

In high-enough numbers, any Omicron infection can wreak havoc. Across the country, people are entering isolation in droves, closing schools and businesses, and hamstringing hospitals that can already ill-afford a staffing shortage. In many parts of the country, hospital capacities are already being reached and exceeded, making it difficult for people to seek care for any kind of illness. An overstretched system could also, ironically, mask the extent of Omicron’s tear: When hospitals are full, they cannot accept more patients, artificially deflating recorded rates of severe disease, even as total cases continue to rise. “Omicron may be more mild at the individual symptom level,” Duana Fullwiley, a medical anthropologist at Stanford who has studied how the term mild has affected people’s experience of sickle-cell anemia in Senegal, told me. “But we’re not talking about the severity of Omicron as it’s impacting the system.”

Smartmatic Sues Mike Lindell, Accusing Him of Spreading Election Lies to Sell More Pillows

 https://www.newsweek.com/smartmatic-sues-mike-lindell-accusing-him-spreading-election-lies-sell-more-pillows-1670599

Lindell, a conspiracy theorist who rose to prominence as a trusted friend of former President Donald Trump, became a lead voice pushing Trump's baseless claims that an unprecedented, nationwide conspiracy of voter fraud "stole" the 2020 election from Trump.

While Lindell has pushed numerous conspiracy theories to explain Trump's loss, he has mainly focused on voting machines from Smartmatic and Dominion Voting Systems. He has alleged that these machines switched votes from Trump to current President Joe Biden.

However, Smartmatic's voting machines were only used in one U.S. county during the 2020 election, Los Angeles County, Forbes reported. Neither Lindell nor anyone else has yet to produce concrete evidence proving that the machines flipped votes during the election.

Leading haredi rabbi: Father can report child's abuse to police

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/320741
Kikar Hashabbat on Tuesday publicized a video of Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky, a leading Lithuanian-haredi rabbi, in which he can be heard encouraging those whose children were molested to turn to the police.

In the video, which was filmed around twenty years ago, Rabbi Kanievsky is asked, "Unfortunately, I have a cousin in America, whose children were hurt by someone. What should he do? He wants to look into the matter and he is asking if he can involve the police."

In response, Rabbi Kanievsky can be heard asking, "What is the question?" to which the questioner responds, "Someone hurt an 11-year-old boy, and he is asking if he is permitted to turn to the police and complain that there is someone evil there."

"Obviously it is permitted for him to do this, in order to save others - in order to save others it is allowed," 

Rabbi Kanievsky responded.The questioner continued, "He doesn't need to go first to beit din (a Jewish court)?"

"Apparently. The assumption is that it is permitted to save others," Rabbi Kanievsky said.


לפני כעשרים שנה, נשאל מרן שר התורה הגאון רבי חיים קנייבסקי, האם מותר לפנות למשטרה נגד אדם שפגע בילד? והשיב בנחרצות: "מותר, כדי להציל אחרים"; התיעוד מהפסק, נחשף כעת