Category: Crap For Brains

Oregon removes writing, reading, and math mastery from high school graduation requirements

The Oregon State Board of Education unanimously voted on Thursday to remove proof of mastery in reading, writing, and math in order to graduate from high school until 2029.

The board argued that requiring all students to pass one of several standardized tests or to create an in-depth assignment their teacher judged as meeting state standards was a harmful hurdle for students of color, disabled students, or those learning English as a second language. The standardized tests will still be given but will not play a role in determining whether students receive their diplomas.

“We haven’t suspended any sort of assessments,” state board member Vicky Lopez Sanchez said during the board meeting. “The only thing we are suspending is the inappropriate use of how those assessments were being used. I think that really is in the best interest of Oregon students.”

Opponents of the new order argued that removing the requirement devalues an Oregon diploma. The opponents argued that helping students with low academic skills through extra instruction in writing and math has helped them. However, supporters claim that forcing students to spend extra time on schoolwork eliminates their opportunity to take an elective and does not translate to how they perform after graduation.

“We are unable to ethically make a different decision at this point. It is also unethical for us to continue to require this when we know it can continue to cause harm and has had no change in how students are performing,” Board of Education Chairwoman Guadalupe Martinez Zapata told ABC’s KATU-2.

Hundreds of state residents have filed public comments on the subject, and most are in favor of keeping the requirements. But mastery is not the only graduation requirement. Students also need to earn a certain amount of credits and create an education plan that helps them achieve their goals after high school.

The pause was initiated during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, when schools across the country were forced to shut down

No, they haven’t.

Rabbi Claims That Hamas Has ‘Perverted Islam.’ Alas, No.

It’s understandable that in times of crisis, people would reach out for reassurance, for some indication that things aren’t as dismal as they seem. Still, when times are tough, it is more important than ever not to be seduced by wishful thinking.

In a disheartening exercise of willful ignorance and the myopia that wishful thinking can induce, the Jerusalem Post published a curious piece Tuesday entitled “Hamas has perverted Islam for their sacrilegious, blasphemous actions.” The author, Yakov Nagen, is identified as a rabbi and “the director of Ohr Torah Stone’s Blickle Institute for Interfaith Dialogue.” Interfaith dialogue is a realm in which self-delusion can all too easily run wild and fond hopes reign supreme over reality; Nagen’s article is, unfortunately, yet another example of this.

“What empowers Hamas and allows it to thrive,” Nagen asserts, “is that too many have accepted their corruption of the teachings of a world religion.” He notes with satisfaction that Hamas does have opponents within the Islamic world: “Hundreds of Muslim leaders signed a public statement issued by the Global Imams Council (GIC) unequivocally condemning the massacre. In the condemnation, they refer to a legal ruling issued by the Islamic Fatwa Council, located in the Iraqi spiritual capital of Najaf: ‘It is prohibited to pray for, join, support, finance, or fight on behalf of Hamas.’”

That sounds wonderful, but then Nagen adds, “The ruling enumerated 11 correlations between Hamas and ISIS, including the use of suicide bombers, missile attacks against civilians, and genocidal aspirations, in the case of Hamas annihilating the Jews.”

It is unpleasant, but nonetheless true: neither ISIS nor Hamas originated these ideas. They are all rooted in core Islamic texts. The justification for suicide bombing is in the Qur’an, the holy book of Islam: “Indeed, Allah has bought from the believers their lives and their wealth, because the garden will be theirs, they will fight in the way of Allah and will kill and be killed.” (9:111) This is the only promise of paradise in the Qur’an, but one can take hold of that promise by being killed while killing unbelievers.

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All failures – if this can be called that –  especially that of opponents, should also be studied for lessons to be learned.

Consider; If they all became ‘martyrs’ would there be a problem?

Hamas’s Strategy of Human Sacrifice
Never before has a party adopted a war strategy to maximize civilian deaths on its own side.

On October 13, Israeli military commanders told Palestinians living in Gaza to evacuate to the south. The northern half of the strip is full of Hamas assets—from rockets to rifles, communications gear to personnel—that Israel plans to destroy in the coming days of the war. But Hamas leaders demanded that the people stay in place. Why?

While some of Hamas’s most brutal tactics, like systematic rape and beheading captives, are long-practiced atrocities for which the armies of Stalin, Hitler, and Genghis Khan are infamous, it is unprecedented for a party to adopt a war strategy to maximize civilian deaths on its own side. This is so strange and evil that it should appall any decent person. Contrary to conventional commentary, this is not a human shield strategy. It’s a human sacrifice strategy.

Since its birth in 1987, Hamas has declared its aim to destroy Israel. Its strategy is asymmetric—that is, because Hamas is smaller and weaker than the Israeli army, it relies on a strategy designed to undermine Israel politically. In hopes (presumably) that it can induce Saudi leaders to drop their plans to normalize relations with Israel, Hamas launched this war with two goals. First, to provoke uprisings among Arabs and Muslims, both within and outside Israel. Second, to cause the rest of the world to view Israel with disgust and hatred.

To achieve these aims, Hamas is ensuring that its war will harm and kill large numbers of Palestinians in Gaza. To bring this about, it has strategized and laid groundwork for years. Its aim is to propagandize a gullible world—to put the blood of Palestinian victims on Israel’s hands.

Defense officials in numerous countries, for operational reasons and to comply with international laws of war, take pains to locate their military assets away from their civilians and to maximize protection for the latter. Hamas officials do the opposite. As United Nations officials and others have disapprovingly noted, Hamas stores ammunition in schools, puts missile launchers adjacent to mosques, sets up command centers in hospitals, and generally bases its operations in densely populated civilian neighborhoods.

This is not simply a human-shield strategy, where the aim is to deter an attack by using innocent lives as a barrier. Hamas is doing something far more insidious: it’s ensuring the mass death of Palestinians. Here is Hamas official Ali Baraka summing up the difference between the two worldviews: “The Israelis are known to love life. We, on the other hand, sacrifice ourselves. We consider our dead to be martyrs.”

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Judge Bars Trump From Campaigning Against His Top Political Opponent

A U.S. District Court judge has barred former President Donald Trump from campaigning against his top political opponent: the federal government.

On Monday, Judge Tanya Chutkan issued a gag order to prohibit the Republican frontrunner from speaking out on the case just more than a year out from the next election. The order bars Trump from publicly defending himself against attacks from potential witnesses, court personnel, or federal prosecutors in the case, including Special Counsel Jack Smith.

“This is not about whether I like the language Mr. Trump uses,” Judge Chutkan reportedly said. “This is about language that presents a danger to the administration of justice.”

The order itself, however, presents a danger to American democracy. Democrats are already trying to prevent Americans from being given the chance to vote on the former president. Now, far-left activists are wielding the judiciary to prevent Trump from leading an effective campaign. With a more than 45-point lead in the Republican primary, Trump isn’t running against the other candidates attempting to challenge him. He’s running against the Department of Justice, and the Department of Justice under President Joe Biden is running against him with 44 federal indictments to thwart the GOP frontrunner’s triumphant return.

The special counsel prosecuting Trump over protestors’ 2021 attack on the Capitol requested the gag order in September, alleging the former president’s statements over the case sought to “undermine the integrity of these proceedings and prejudice the jury pool.” Yet the proceedings were undermined from the start with the selection of Judge Chutkan to preside over the politically charged case in the nation’s capital. Just more than a week after Smith requested the gag order, Chutkan refused a motion from Trump’s legal team that she recuse herself from the trial.

There has never been any doubt on how Chutkan might rule on consequential decisions since the Jan. 6 indictments were first handed down on Aug. 1. An activist judge with an obvious animus against the former president and his supporters, federal prosecutors could not have been given a more friendly judge in a district more friendly to the government’s case. Beyond the fact residents in Washington D.C. voted for Biden over Trump in 2020 by a whopping 92 to 5 percent, an Emerson College survey found a majority, 64 percent, had already made up their minds to vote in favor of convicting Trump if they were selected for his jury. Only 8 percent said they would find Trump innocent, and another 28 percent were unsure. Chutkan herself is likely among those who would vote in favor of convicting based on recent rulings and statements.

According to the Associated Press in August, the Obama-appointed judge built a reputation as “a tough punisher of Capitol rioters.” Chutkan presided over more than three dozen cases of those charged with crimes related to the Capitol riot.

“Other judges typically have handed down sentences that are more lenient than those requested by prosecutors,” reported the AP. “Chutkan, however, has matched or exceeded prosecutors’ recommendations in 19 of her 38 sentences. In four of those cases, prosecutors weren’t seeking any jail time at all.”

Chutkan has also condemned comparisons of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot to the deadly riots for so-called “social justice” of 2020. The fiery riots, she claimed in one hearing, were actually “the actions of people protesting, mostly peacefully, for civil rights.” The Capitol riot, on the other hand, was an attempt to “violently overthrow the government.” Never mind the $2 billion worth of damage, making the outbreak of leftist violence one of the most destructive in American history, and “protestors” targeting of federal buildings. The carnage from the summer of rage cost 66 times more than the estimated damage done to the Capitol in the hours-long riot.

Trump’s Republican rivals attacked him for shelling out a disproportionate amount of campaign funds for his own legal defense. Those attacks, however, fail to grapple with the reality that for Trump, his serious opponents aren’t the other Republicans in the race. His primary contest is one with the federal government trying to silence him.

BLUF
Now, I don’t think for a minute that Biden is “directing all of this” — he’s getting directed by his staff. But even CBS is now throwing him under the bus by questioning his age and ability to do the job. You know how bad the interview truly was when that’s the takeaway.

More on Disastrous Biden Interview: Scott Pelley Has to Help Him Finish Sentence, Says President ‘Tired’

I wrote earlier about a couple of the teaser clips from the “60 Minutes” interview with Joe Biden.

Those were bad, but the complete interview was even worse.

First, we should note that there was a little bit of water-carrying for Joe Biden with host Scott Pelley saying that the president was fitting them into his busy schedule on Thursday.

Biden had his 10 a.m. daily briefing and a 4:30 meeting where he just had to sit and listen to CEOs, how is that busy? Maybe it’s “busy” for an 80-year-old who has so many issues. But that’s why he shouldn’t even be there.

Biden seemed completely at sea throughout the interview, and so old.

Pelley asked if he could foresee U.S. troops involved in the Israeli war. Notice his answer: it wasn’t “no.”

It was “I don’t think it’s necessary” because “Israel has one of the finest fighting forces in the country.” Um, Joe? Israel is its own country, it’s not part of the U.S., what are you even saying here? In what country?

Then he threw Israel under the bus with this confusing remark, saying they should not reoccupy Gaza, that he thought that would be a “big mistake.” Funny, that’s just what Iran was hoping Joe would say, and there he is right on cue. You can see him struggling to answer this question.

Pelley asks what was his message to “Hezbollah and its backer Iran.” Biden’s response wouldn’t exactly send fear down any bad actor’s back, and Pelley even had to finish his thought for him.

I’m sure Iran is quaking in their boots right now.

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All your printers are belong to us

Background checks for printer purchases

New bill intro by Assemblywoman Jenifer Rajkumar, A-8132, Requires a criminal history background check for the purchase of a three-dimensional printer capable of creating firearms; prohibits sale to a person who would be disqualified on the basis of criminal history from being granted a license to possess a firearm.

From the bill memorandum:

Three-dimensionally printed firearms, a type of untraceable ghost gun, can be built by anyone using an $150 three-dimensional printer.

Three-dimensional printed guns are growing more prevalent each year. There were 100 taken off the streets of New York City in 2019. That number skyrocketed to 637 in 2022.

Concurrently, ghost gun shootings have risen 1,000% across the nation. Currently, three-dimensional printers allow people to make, buy, sell, and use untraceable guns without any background checks.

This bill will require a background check so that three-dimensional printed firearms do not get in the wrong hands.

Biden Admin Gave Hamas $75 Million While Knowing Terror Attack Was Imminent

Democrat President Joe Biden’s administration gave Hamas $75 million in early October, just days before the group launched an assault against Israel and after learning that a terrorist attack was imminent.

The aid was pushed through in a quiet move bypassing Republican obstructionism.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken approved the release of $75 million in funding for Hamas-controlled Gaza.

Blinken diverted the cash to Hamas just hours before the funds were set to be redistributed elsewhere.

The move was hushed through with little attention in early October, just days before Hamas launched its terrorist attacks against Israel, slaughtering, raping, and kidnapping hundreds of innocent civilians.

However, the funding was approved after the U.S. government learned that Hamas was likely planning an upcoming terror attack against Israel.

Blinken’s decision came after months of pressure from Democrat lawmakers and dozens of civil society groups.

They warned that blocking the aid would create a humanitarian disaster for over one million Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank.

The aid had been held up by Republican Senators who were pushing back against the release of the funds.

Senator Jim Risch and Representative Michael McCaul, the top Republicans on the Senate and House of Representatives Foreign Relations Committees, have since late July been blocking the State Department from providing funds to the UN’s Palestine refugee agency (UNRWA).

After he assumed office, Biden reversed President Donald Trump’s efforts to squeeze off funding to the UN agency and Hamas.

UNRWA thanked Blinken for the funds that will sustain its food distribution through early 2024.

“Thank you [Blinken] for providing $75 million in food assistance to Palestine refugees in Gaza!” said UNRWA

“This generous support from the American people will allow UNRWA to continue this critical aspect of its humanitarian and human development work through the end of Q1 2024.”

Meanwhile, more details have emerged the Biden admin also sent $33.7 million from the American Rescue Plan.

The spending bill was meant for Americans to combat Covid during the pandemic.

It was sent to a Palestinian relief organization that has previously been accused of providing safe harbor to terrorists in Gaza.

Burning Down (The Economic) House?
Food Prices UP 20% Under Bidenomics, Credit Card Delinquencies Now Higher Than During Covid As Credit Card Debt Grows To All-time High To Cope With Inflation

Is Biden trying to burn down the economic house? Under Bidenomics, America’s middle class and low wage workers are suffering from a wild, wild life in terms of inflation.

First, food prices are up 20% since December 2020. Talk about destruction of middle class wealth!

That is in addition to gasoline prices are up 64% under Biden while rent growth is up 252%. Well, Biden waived through millions of illegal immigrants and rent had to rise. Biden and Washington DC’s broken borders is Livin’ La Vida Loco.

To cope with inflation (that Paul Krugman claims is over but the last inflation report showed that the tinders of inflation are hard to extinguish), consumers have turned to credit cards to survive. In fact, credit cards have expanded 38% since April 2021 despite rapidly rising interest rates. And credit card delinquency rates are rising and are now above Covid-era economic shutdown levels.

Despite Krugman and Yellen’s screaming that inflation has been crushed, US household are anticipating FASTER inflation. To paraphrase the Emperor of Austria from “Amadeus,” “You are passionate Krugman and Yellen, but you do not persuade.”

And Billions Biden has just recorded the third largest deficit in history.

demoncrap SOP for decades; Throw money at the problem.

Appeasement in Real Time
Biden and Blinken pay the Dane-Geld

It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,
For fear they should succumb and go astray;
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say:–

For fear they should succumb and go astray;
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say:

“We never pay any-one Dane-geld,
No matter how trifling the cost;
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
And the nation that plays it is lost!”

Rudyard Kipling, Dane-Geld (closing verses).

LESSONS OF MUNICH – WEAKNESS INVITES AGGRESSION.

Showing weakness has long been regarded as an invitation to aggression and war. Perhaps the most infamous example in modern history is Neville Chamberlain’s sit-down with Adolph Hitler in Munich in 1938, where he agreed to appease Hitler by agreeing to Germany’s annexation of the Sudetenland, in exchange for “peace for our time.”

But history has taught us that, like paying the Dane-Geld, such appeasement is more likely to cause war and indescribable suffering than it is to prevent it.  Despite those blood-soaked lessons, the appeasement gene continues to proliferate among cowardly politicians. 

There are countless examples of this in modern history, but it is beyond the scope of this short article to attempt to catalogue them here.  Each reader will think of examples.

Often the end results of policy decisions and statements, and how they invite more aggression and war, are not fully apparent until sometime later when it is too late because the damage has already occurred.  Joe Biden’s statement that a limited Russian invasion of Ukraine might be somewhat tolerable or at least met with dissention among the Western allies, is a good example.  Predicting what Russia would do, he said, “it depends on what it does. It’s one thing if it’s a minor incursion and we end up having to fight about what to do and not do.” Even though Biden and his handlers tried to “walk back” (the press’ euphemism of correcting a dumb statement) that invitation, the damage was already done – Biden had sent a signal to Putin of his thinking, and it was a signal of weakness.

To the extent that we can, it therefore is important to call out such projections of weakness and appeasement in real time, as they are occurring. Because of the homicidal intent of the Islamists in the Mideast – indeed, across the globe – it is of over-riding importance to shine a light – no, to focus, focus and focus – on the most recent examples of this appeasement that are certain to cause more bloodshed, not only in Israel and the Mideast, but in the United States, Europe, and other countries worldwide.

I am referring to the blatant lies and craven cowardice by U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and his ostensible boss, Joe Biden, which have further encouraged Iran in its support for its and its proxies’ murderous jihad against Israel (and potentially the U.S. and Europe) about the supposed non-involvement of Iran in the barbaric atrocities Hamas is perpetrating upon Israeli civilians. These are not civilian “collateral damage” caused by bombing, when Hamas attempts to hide among civilian shields or has situated its arms caches near hospitals and mosques.  And, contrary to some attempts by our media to equate the two, they most decidedly are not in any way comparable to the IDF’s targeting and killing of the barbaric Hamas fighters terrorists.

Blinken led off on Sunday, October 8, with his claim that our government has no evidence that Iran is behind Hamas’ bloody and barbaric attacks on women, girls, babies, and other civilians. And his weasel-worded statement encourages both Iran and Hamas with its blatant evasions and flat-out lies.

BLINKEN’S WEASEL-WORDED EVASIONS AND DENIALS

 Sunday, on NBC’s Meet the Press, and CNN’s State of the Union.  Blinken said, “In this moment, we don’t have anything that shows us that Iran was directly involved in this attack, in planning it or in carrying it out.” “In this specific instance, we have not yet seen evidence that Iran directed or was behind this particular attack.”

What a weasel-worded evasion.

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Secretary of State Blinken Accidentally Admits Biden Admin Funded Attack on Israel

It took little time for people to connect the dots between Joe Biden’s unfreezing of $6 billion in Iranian assets last month — part of a prisoner swap — and the Hamas attack on Israel. Hamas gets funding from Iran, and all the restrictions on how Iran can spend their money are meaningless. In fact, Hamas spokesman Ghazi Hamad told the BBC that Iran did give financial support to Hamas for its surprise attack on Israel, and a senior adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, confirmed this.

That hasn’t stopped the Biden administration from desperately trying to absolve itself of responsibility for the deadly attack, which has set off yet another war in the region.

“Let’s be clear,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller wrote on X. “The deal to bring U.S. citizens home from Iran has nothing to do with the horrific attack on Israel. Not a penny has been spent, and when it is, it can only go for humanitarian needs like food and medicine. Anything to the contrary is false.”

Variations of this talking point have been repeated ad nauseam by various members of the Biden administration. One of them was Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who did the rounds on the Sunday morning talk shows to defend the Biden administration. He claimed on ABC’s “This Week” that “not a single dollar from that account has actually been spent to date, and in any event, it’s very carefully and closely regulated by the Treasury Department to make sure that it’s only used for food, for medicine, for medical equipment.”

Cute story, right? Well, that may be the line the administration is pushing, but when Blinken appeared on “Meet The Press,” he let slip some actual truth.

“What do you say about the argument that money is fungible — so Iran may have known this money is coming and used other funds to help fund this attack?” asked host Kristen Welker.

“Iran has unfortunately always used and focused its funds on supporting terrorism, on supporting groups like Hamas,” Blinken replied. “And it’s done that when there have been sanctions, it’s done that when there haven’t been sanctions, and it’s always prioritized that.”

That admission completely undermines the talking points that the Biden administration has been pushing. They unfroze $6 billion for Iran, and Iran funded the Hamas attack. It’s that simple. Per Blinken’s own words, the condition of the money only being used for humanitarian purposes is meaningless. Iran will always use money to fund terrorism.

So if the Biden administration knows Iran funds terrorism, why did it unfreeze $6 billion as part of the prisoner exchange last month? There’s no good answer to that — or to the question of why the Obama administration and now the Biden administration are so intent on giving the Iranian regime a pathway to nuclear weapons.

Gun-grabbing New Mexico governor will not give in

Just a few weeks back, New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham declared a public health emergency to attain what she believed was the legal justification to override the 2nd Amendment. Her public health emergency was created out of thin air to give herself the power to mandate a 30 day ban on the public carry of firearms in Albuquerque and the surrounding county. She said, “No Constitutional right, in my view, including my oath, is intended to be absolute.”

The backlash was swift as police departments denied her support in enforcing the rule, the public defied the governor by carrying openly in public to make a point, and even the media, along with some of her fellow Democrats ridiculed her by saying she was overreaching her power. Apparently, this corrupt governor did not care and continued to demand that the police departments enforce her unconstitutional rule regardless of its unconstitutionality, She created an unjustified “health emergency” as a vehicle to push her “one woman dictate” over the people of New Mexico.

Grisham used the death of an 11-year-old boy in an attempt to create irrational fear and hype in her pursuit to violate the rights of the citizens she represents.  Standing on the graves of dead children has been an effective tool for gun-grabbing politicians, as it drums up irrational fear among parents and directs anger toward gun owners. The implication is that these heinous killings wouldn’t happen if gun owners would “compromise-away” their rights. In Grisham’s case, it would appear she used the tragedy to portray herself as the hero.

In response to the overreaching rule, A Federal Judge temporarily blocked Gresham’s ban on carrying guns in Albuquerque and its surrounding county. Bernalillo County Sheriff John Allen said, “This order will not do anything to curb gun violence other than punish law-abiding citizens who have a constitutional right to self-defense.”

In defiance of the law and the Constitution, Grisham recently revised her public health order prohibiting firearms in parks, playgrounds and other public places where children go in Albuquerque. The governor also added a provision that tasks the state Department of Public Safety with organizing safe surrender events — also known as gun buybacks — in Albuquerque, Española and Las Cruces within a month. According to Maddy Hayden, a spokeswoman for the governor, the renewed order will remain in effect until Nov. 3.

As an additional slap in the face to New Mexicans, Grisham said, “We’re not letting up, and I’m continuing to make investments that drive down violence in our communities and protect our children.”

Throughout this entire battle, Grisham has failed to offer any solutions to solve the problem of “human violence,” and only seems to be focused on gun control. As usual, and like other gun-grabbing governors, Grisham appears to be avoiding responsibility for the violence that is created as a direct result of failed Democrat policies.

After several lawsuits last month in response to the Governors’ 30-day gun ban, U.S. District Judge David Herrera Urias issued the initial restraining order but has delayed a decision on whether to order a preliminary injunction against the edict. Grisham seems to be taking full advantage of every bit of power she can dig up in the meantime.

Michelle Lujan Grisham is the exact type of person our Founding Fathers warned us about. Her attempt to unilaterally suspend the right to carry is why the 2nd Amendment was written, and why so many New Mexico gun owners stood up and defied her unconstitutional order.

Yes, there does actually seem to be people this dense and ignorant.
“…shared cultural norms…”