Jerome R. Corsi's Blog, page 16

A lesson for New York City from Canada

The lovely ladies over at Twitchy.com brought to their readers’ attention this week a complaint from Canadian citizen Glen McGregor, who posted on X that he injured his knee playing softball and will need an MRI, but the province of Ontario requires that he get an ultrasound first.

OK, fair enough. Except that McGregor was told by the local medical imaging facility that the wait for an ultrasound would be one to two years – and would he like to be added to the waitlist?

Commentors on McGregor’s post noted that this is what “free” and “universal” health care means; that subsidizing millions of illegal immigrants doesn’t help matters; that Canada is quick to offer MAID (“Medical Assistance In Dying”) if you can’t wait for care (or are denied it – yes, that happens too); and that while health care in the United States can be ungodly expensive, access is nearly immediate.

I often write about the disastrous results of central economic planning (including health care). In fact, I wrote a column on that topic at the end of the first year of the Biden administration, in which I referenced a university panel discussion I had attended years earlier. “Obamacare” was much in the news at the time, so the topic of that panel discussion was (unsurprisingly) the benefits of “free” and “universal” health care.

And – oh, the irony – access to MRIs featured prominently.

One of the speakers defending the Canadian system was indignant about the number of MRI facilities in the United States, arguing that Canada had far fewer such facilities, and it was just fine. She complained that both hospitals in her town had MRI machines, and both were adding hospital beds. “Why should every town have an MRI facility?” she protested angrily. “And we don’t need that many hospital beds.” In her opinion (though she was neither a physician nor an expert in health care administration), the government was in a better position to decide what medical resources people needed in any given area.

Looking back at that discussion, I wrote in 2021, “Had (the female panelist) been in a position to stop the two hospitals’ capital expenditures, neither one would likely have been able to meet the (then) unforeseen capacity issues caused by last year’s COVID-19 pandemic – not to mention to growing demand for services created by an aging population. How many times do we have to learn this lesson? No one can predict the future.”

And now – 15 or so years after that panel discussion – poor McGregor is on a one- to two-year waitlist for an ultrasound in Canada. After which, presumably, he’ll get on another waitlist for the MRI.

Would the female panelist still think that’s “just fine”?

But there were even more insights into the central planners’ fever dreams in that panel discussion. Again, quoting from my 2021 column:

“Another academic in the audience stood up to emphatically support her position. He was irate about toothpaste. ‘I was just at the drug store,’ he said, ‘and there had to have been 20 brands of toothpaste. We don’t need 20 brands of toothpaste!’

“Welcome to the worldview that spawned the Soviet Union’s breadlines and Venezuela’s national dumpster diet of zoo animals.”

“Health care is a human right” sounds like an unassailable slogan. But – as McGregor’s experience demonstrates – the reality of government-dispensed health care is very different: It’s no longer a right; it’s barely even an option.

The same puckered planners who insist that there are too many MRI machines, hospital beds and brands of toothpaste will, if given the chance, demand that there be fewer types of fruits in the produce section of the grocery store (who eats dragon fruit, anyway?), varieties of cars (why isn’t one kind of car enough? You have four children? Oh, there’s the problem – you have too many children…) and brands of shoes. In fact, as they think about it, there are just too many damn sizes of shoes.

They will assure you that the government – meaning they and their cronies – will do a better job and fairer job of allocating resources and producing society’s goods and services than all these proliferating entrepreneurs and private companies.

But history proves otherwise.

Opponents of communism and socialism often focus – quite properly – on the political oppression characteristic of those types of governments. But it’s worth remembering that of the 100 million to 150 million people who have died under collectivist regimes, most haven’t died in wars or in concentration camps or at the hands of dictators and their secret police in political “purges.”

No, most starved to death.

And that doesn’t even count the millions more who suffered but survived privations of all sorts. (Many such individuals and their families have immigrated to the United States, and they know firsthand what it is like to live under collectivist economic systems.)

In most cases, the famines and economic collapses that caused such widespread devastation and death weren’t planned; they were the results of ignorance, arrogance and too much power.

No one can predict the future.

You’d think these lessons, played out over and over again with tens of millions of victims as evidence, would be crystal clear by now.

And yet here we are, with a candidate – Zohran Mamdani – running for mayor of New York City, happily proclaiming himself to be a socialist (notwithstanding The New York Times’ flaccid attempt to paint him as something else), and trying to sell the city’s residents on the benefits of government-owned grocery stores, among other pie-in-the-sky policy proposals.

New York City should take a lesson from Canada (or Venezuela or Cuba or Cambodia or Vietnam or North Korea or Zimbabwe or the Soviet Union): Put the government in charge of anything economic, and it will become expensive, inefficient and inaccessible – except to people with money or political power, of course.

Don’t give communists or socialists (“democratic” or otherwise) or central planners of any sort of any power.

Ever.

Trump’s National Guard deployment and the art of the 80-20 issue

Donald Trump’s recent floated proposal to deploy the National Guard to crime-overrun blue cities like Chicago and Baltimore has been met with howls of outrage from the usual suspects. For many liberal talking heads and Democratic officials, this is simply the latest evidence of Trump’s “authoritarianism.” But such specious analysis and manufactured hysteria distract from what all parties ought to properly focus on: the well-being of the people who actually live in such crime-addled jurisdictions.

What’s remarkable is not just the specific policy suggestion itself – after all, federal force has been called in to assist state-level law enforcement plenty of times – but rather how Trump is once again baiting his political opponents into defending the indefensible. He has a singular talent for making the Left clutch onto wildly unpopular positions and taking the wrong side of clear 80-20 issues. It’s political jiu-jitsu at its finest.

Crime in cities like Chicago and Baltimore isn’t a right-wing fever dream. It’s a persistent, documented crisis that continues to destroy communities and ruin lives. Chicago saw nearly 600 homicides in 2024 alone, “earning” it the dubious title of America’s homicide capital for the 13th consecutive year. In Baltimore, despite a recent downtick, violent crime remains exponentially higher than national averages. Sustained, decades-long Democratic leadership in both cities has failed, time and again, to secure even a minimum baseline level of safety for its residents – many of whom are Black and working-class, the very communities Democrats purport to champion.

Trump sees that leadership and quality-of-life vacuum. And he’s filling it with a popular message of law and order.

Trump’s proposal to deploy the National Guard – if local leadership continues to abdicate their most basic governance duties – isn’t the flight of fancy of a would-be strongman. It’s federalism functioning as the Founders intended: The federal government must step in, per Article IV of the Constitution, when local governance breaks down so catastrophically that the feds are needed to “guarantee … a republican form of government.” Even more specifically, the Insurrection Act of 1807 has long been available as a congressionally authorized tool for presidents to restore order when state unrest reaches truly intolerable levels. Presidents from Jefferson to Eisenhower to Bush 41 have invoked it.

Trump’s critics would rather not have a conversation about bloody cities like Chicago – or the long history of presidents deploying the National Guard when local circumstances require it. They’d rather scream “fascism” than explain why a grandmother in Englewood should have to dodge gang bullets on her way to church. They’d rather chant slogans about “abolishing the police” than face the hard fact that the communities most devastated by crime consistently clamor for more law enforcement – not less.

This is where Trump’s political instincts shine. He doesn’t try to “win” the crime debate by splitting the difference with progressives. He doesn’t offer a milquetoast promise to fund “violence interrupters” or expand toothless social programs. He goes right at the issue, knowing full well that the American people are with him.

Because they are. The public has consistently ranked crime and safety among their top concerns; last November, it was usually a top-five issue in general election exit polling. And polling consistently shows that overwhelming majorities – often in the 70%-80% range – support more police funding and oppose the Left’s radical decarceration agenda. Democrats, ever in thrall to their activist far-left flank, are stuck defending policies with rhetoric that most voters correctly identify as both dangerous and absurd.

Trump knows that when he floats these proposals, Democrats and their corporate media allies won’t respond with nuance. They’ll respond with knee-jerk outrage – just as they did in 2020, when Trump sent federal agents to Portland to stop violent anarchists from torching courthouses. The media framed it as martial law; sane Oregonians saw it as basic governance.

This dynamic plays out again and again. When Trump highlights the border crisis and the need to deport unsavory figures like Mahmoud Khalil and Kilmar Abrego Garcia, Democrats defend open borders. When Trump attacks gender ideology indoctrination in schools, Democrats double down on letting teachers hide children’s “transitions” from their parents. When Trump condemns pro-Hamas rioters in American cities, Democrats can’t bring themselves to say a word of support for Israel’s war against a U.S. State Department-recognized foreign terrorist organization. When Trump signs an executive order seeking to partially recriminalize flag burning, Democrats defend flag burning.

On and on it goes. By now, it’s a well-established pattern. And it’s politically devastating for the Left. Moreover, the relevant history is on Trump’s side. This sort of federal corrective goes back all the way to the republic’s origins; those now freaking out might want to read up on George Washington’s efforts to quash the Whiskey Rebellion in 1794.

Call it the art of the 80-20 issue. Along with his sheer sense of humor, Trump’s instinctual knack for picking such winning battles is one of his greatest political assets. And this time, the winner won’t just be Trump himself – it will be Chicagoans and Baltimoreans as well.

Next steps for DoD to end U.S. reliance on China for rare earths

Rare earth elements

In becoming a majority shareholder of MP Materials, the Trump administration demonstrated the salutary thought that no radical free-market orthodoxy should prevent the United States from taking decisive action, including direct investment of taxpayer dollars, to secure domestic sources of industrial materials vital to our national defense.  It is encouraging that Apple, long known for its Chinese assembly operations, followed up with a $100 billion investment in U.S.-based supply chains, including a significant expansion of MP Materials to furnish magnets for Apple production.

These public-private actions are beginning to remedy a glaring weakness in American industrial infrastructure. MP Materials operates what had been the only significant U.S. mine and processing center for rare earth elements. These are the seventeen indispensable critical minerals essential to multiple major U.S. military weapons systems, plus manufacturing, medicine, infrastructure, and other essential functions of modern American life.

Consistent with being America’s first true “builder” commander-in-chief, President Trump can further reduce America’s rare earth vulnerability by using his executive authorities to grow a finished rare earth element stockpile and begin the construction of processing plants within the United States.

America received its wake-up call on rare earths in April, when China imposed restrictions on the export of several rare earths. China accounts for more than 60 percent of rare earth production and, most alarmingly, over 90 percent of the rare earth processing — the indispensable phase of the mineral supply chain that turns mined raw materials into usable and essential industrial products.

Without rare earth magnets used in brakes, steering, and fuel injectors, U.S. automobile production would stall in a scenario far more damaging than the relatively brief COVID-era semiconductor shortages. Neither the civilian nor military sectors can function without access to the seventeen rare earth elements on the periodic chart – from Cerium (Number 58) to Ytrium (Number 70).

Despite their indispensability, refined rare earths will never be generated in adequate supplies by the private sector responding to the usual market forces and government incentives. Even in China, with vastly lower labor and regulatory costs, heavy state subsidies are required to sustain production. The Chinese Communist Party recognizes the strategic value of such critical mineral production—and dominance of finished global rare earth supply chains—and acts accordingly.

It has taken the United States much longer, too long, to reach that same conclusion. As with maintaining a modern military or building public infrastructure, there are certain things the government must pay for, like a military, because the national interest, indeed, survival, demands it.

Upon returning to the White House, President Trump recognized the strategic peril posed by allowing China to maintain a de facto chokehold over such materials that keep the lights on, water flowing, and the Internet running. In March, he issued the Executive Order “Immediate Measures to Increase American Mineral Production.” The Interior Department is prioritizing mineral extraction on all federally owned lands known to contain deposits, while other agencies, including DoD, are identifying sites suitable for mineral production.

The Pentagon is driving an effort to generate additional supplies of critical minerals needed for weapons production and to refill the stockpile managed by the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA).

Nonetheless, even if the United States were to tap ground deposits instantly, most of the rocks would still go to China for refinement and separation.

The United States, using the Defense Production Act, the Office of Strategic Capital, and the Development Finance Corporation, should finance the construction of a half-a-dozen to a dozen geographically dispersed manufacturers for separating heavy and light rare earths. The plants could be government-owned, private sector operated. A hefty, expensive undertaking, yes. However, having redundant processing plants would break China’s chokehold and avoid the trap of a single point of failure. Some of those facilities could feature remarkable new American separation technologies that use lasers, providing a clean alternative to Chinese environmental abuses.

Nonetheless, even with welcome actions, investments, and reforms pursued by the Trump Administration, it will, under the best of circumstances, take years to establish sufficient domestic processing capacity. Yet, by some informed estimates, conflict with China, which would effectively cut off the supply of commercial-grade rare earth magnets and metals, could come at any time.

Consequently, the Defense Department needs a crash program for DLA to buy, and stockpile finished rare earth mineral powders, oxides, and parts irrespective of their country of origin—including, if necessary, China. Congressional lawmakers in both parties have proven receptive to urgent appropriations requests when presented with solid facts.

The United States can move fast when there’s a will to do so. Take the first Trump Administration’s launch of Operation Warp Speed, which defied expectations (and critics) to produce and distribute a coronavirus vaccine in under a year. Building the capacity to assure reliable supplies of processed rare earths will take longer. But that is all the reason to start now.

Jeffrey Jeb Nadaner  is a senior vice president at Govini, the defense acquisition software company. He served as deputy assistant defense secretary for industrial policy in the first Trump administration.

This article was originally published by RealClearDefense and made available via RealClearWire.

Study: Women who get abortions twice as likely to be hospitalized for mental health issues

Women who receive abortions are twice as likely to suffer mental health episodes that require hospitalization compared to women who give birth, a new study has found.

The study, which compared 28,721 women who received abortions with 1,228,807 women who gave birth in Quebec, Canada between 2006 and 2022, found that “Abortion was strongly associated with mental health hospitalization within five years.” The hospitalizations included those admitted for psychiatric disorders, substance use disorders, and suicide attempts.

“While these findings are not evidence of a causal link between abortion and long-term mental health sequelae, they support the possibility that abortion may be a marker of an increased lifetime risk of mental disorders,” the study reads. “Screening for mental disorders at the time of abortion may be an opportunity to identify women who could benefit from psychological and social support, particularly women with preexisting mental health disorders, under age 25 years, and with previous live births or abortions.”

Women who aborted their babies were more than twice as likely to suffer a mental health episode that required hospitalization, with 104.0 per 10,000 women per year requiring mental health services compared to 42.0 in 10,000 women who did not abort, according to the study. Women under the age of 25 or those suffering from a preexisting mental health condition were especially at risk of mental health-related hospitalization following an abortion.

The first five years following an abortion had the strongest correlation to mental health episodes, but the “risks waned over time,” the study found. The risk for women who had abortions took about 17 years to begin “to resemble” that of women who gave birth.

Between 2006 and 2022, the number of women who had an abortion who were later hospitalized after an attempted suicide was 14.7 per 10,000, according to the study. About 56.7 per 10,000 women were hospitalized due to substance abuse disorders compared to 15 per 10,000 women who carried their babies to term. Overall psychiatric disorder hospitalizations for women who had abortions occurred in 85.1 per 10,000 women compared to 37.1 per 10,000 women who did not abort.

The study was funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Quebec Health Research Fund.

The study also cited previous research that found “While patients with abortions were more likely to have a new psychiatric diagnosis after pregnancy than patients with deliveries, they were also more likely to have a psychiatric diagnosis before pregnancy.”

Women who already had children were at an increased risk of suffering a mental health episode that required hospitalization after an abortion compared to women receiving abortions who did not already have children, the study found.

Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Pam Bondi shares update on D.C. intern murder

U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi

Attorney General Pam Bondi appeared on Fox News Friday and announced a major breakthrough in the murder case of the young Washington, D.C. intern who was fatally shot just a mile from the White House on June 30.

A gunman shot and killed Eric Tarpinian-Jachym, 21, a University of Massachusetts Amherst student interning for Republican Kansas Rep. Ron Estes, near the Mount Vernon Square Metro Station on June 30. Bondi said on “Hannity” that federal and local law enforcement arrested two juvenile suspects who will be charged as adults.

“They made an arrest, thanks to the FBI. Kash Patel did incredible work since June 30 when this happened [and] arrested two juveniles. They’re 17. They will be charged as adults,” Bondi told host Sean Hannity.

Bondi used the moment to highlight a broader law enforcement initiative she said was launched under President Donald Trump’s directive.

WATCH:

“This was horrific, and that’s why we had to make D.C. safe again. That was President Trump’s directive. There have been over 1900 arrests since we’ve started taking D.C. back and making it safe,” Bondi added.

Bondi said the wave of arrests and gun seizures across Washington, D.C. proves the city’s crime crisis is being brought under control.

“Over 198 guns have been taken off the street. Just last night, 10 more guns and 73 arrests were made in D.C. That shows how prevalent it has been and what a difference that’s being made right now in our nation’s capital. And not only that, President Trump wants to make it beautiful again and especially make it safe. That’s what’s been so important. These families should never have to go through what Eric’s family is going through,” Bondi said.

Local media reported that authorities charged two unidentified 17-year-olds as adults in the June shooting that killed Tarpinian-Jachym with a stray bullet. U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro reportedly pointed to the suspects’ criminal histories as evidence of what she called D.C.’s dangerously lenient juvenile crime laws.

Trump cited juvenile crime as a major driver of violence in Washington, D.C. before launching a federal law enforcement crackdown across the city in August. Since then, he has deployed additional federal agents, taken operational control of the Metropolitan Police Department, and stationed National Guard troops in key public areas.

Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Sorting out fact from fiction when ‘ancient wisdom’ is adopted in societies

Over the past decade there has been an explosion of interest in indigenous knowledge. The United States, Canada, Australia, and South Africa have been at the forefront of the movement to integrate ‘ancient wisdom’ with modern science and decision-making by applying it to everything from public health to climate change. The appeal is both understandable and alluring. For millennia, indigenous cultures have accumulated a vast repository of information that has helped them to adapt and survive. Prior to European contact, the Quechua of the Andes used quinine from the bark of the cinchona tree to treat fevers. It later proved to be the first effective treatment for malaria. Salicin from the willow tree was used by tribes in the Americas to treat pain, fever, and inflammation and led to the development of aspirin. The active ingredient in snakeroot,  reserpine, was used for centuries by native peoples in India to treat high blood pressure and was adopted by Western physicians as an early treatment for hypertension. From stellar navigation to sophisticated construction techniques, agricultural innovations, and hunting strategies, indigenous knowledge has made significant contributions to human progress.  

Romanticizing Traditional Knowledge 

While these achievements deserve respect, many practices promoted under the banner of indigenous knowledge lack scientific merit and should be approached with caution. In Australia, attempts to incorporate the Aboriginal practice of ‘spiritual healing’ into the health system have been met with alarm as it involves a belief in sorcery and supernatural intrusions rather than biological agents. In the United States, alternative treatments include Native American herbal remedies, spiritual ceremonies, and sweat lodges. The use of these untested therapies divert valuable resources away from evidence-based medicine and can legitimize ineffective alternatives. In some cases cancer patients have refused proven treatments for traditional remedies.    

This trend also extends to the romanticization of ancient European knowledge. Just because a practice has been followed for centuries does not automatically elevate it to the status of ‘ancient wisdom.’ Bloodletting, which can be traced back to ancient Egypt, has been used in Europe since the Middle Ages to treat an array of medical conditions until the 1850s – and may have hastened the death of George Washington, who had an estimated 40 percent of his blood removed prior to his death. As Historian William Stahl observes: “The writings of the ancients…were cherished and preserved as golden sayings. Our own household remedy books, so popular in the last century, contained page after page of worthless cures taken from … Dioscorides, Galen, Pliny and …Apuleius.” There is a long history of once revered European beliefs that have not passed scientific muster from astrology and alchemy. While once held to be legitimate knowledge, each of these practices eventually collapsed under the weight of scientific scrutiny.    

The Rise of Indigenous Pseudoscience  

Nowhere has the trend of embracing indigenous knowledge gained more of a foothold in mainstream institutions than in New Zealand where the government has given it equal status with science in the school qualification system. This elevation has resulted in many grandiose claims about the power of the Māori lunar calendar to influence everything from human health and well-being to horticulture and the weather. In 2023, Māori politician Hana Maipi-Clarke asserted that the calendar could be used to predict floods. There is no evidence to support this claim. Many factors affect rainfall: air and water temperature, atmospheric pressure, cloud formation, wind, humidity, the jet stream, and the burning of fossil fuels. The moon is not one of them. Another popular claim is that a full moon can affect plant growth by pulling moisture in the soil upward to nourish seedlings. The moon’s gravitational pull on soil moisture is negligible.  

Just last year the government allocated $400,000 dollars to study if lunar phases affect pregnancy activities despite studies consistently showing no correlation between lunar phases with childbirth and health outcomes. Such projects divert important resources from evidence-based maternal care. The relevant factors in birth outcomes are biological, genetic, and medical, not the waxing and waning of the moon. One of the more far-fetched claims has been advanced by psychiatrist Dr. Hinemoa Elder. She has written a popular book in which she asserts that the Māwharu phase of the Māori lunar calendar is associated with enhanced female sexual libido. More concerning are reports of patients discontinuing their medication for bipolar disorder to instead use lunar phases to regulate their mood.  

There are even reports of public school teachers using the calendar to guide their lessons – adjusting them to synch with the phases of the moon. Some refuse to give exams during ‘high energy’ phases as they believe students will lack focus and be prone to misbehavior. One teacher told a reporter for the country’s largest education union, “If it’s a low energy day, I might not test that week. We’ll do meditation, mirimiri [massage]. I slowly build their learning up, and by the time of high energy days we know the kids will be energetic.” Some government officials have even taken to scheduling meetings on days deemed less likely to trigger conflict. There is no scientific evidence to support these claims.  

Separating Science from Superstition 

Indigenous traditions deserve respect but they must be held to the same rigorous standard as other bodies of knowledge. Some ‘ancient wisdom’ is has proved to be genuinely valuable, while other claims lack scientific grounding or have yet to undergo rigorous testing. For science to survive the culture wars, scientists must be willing to evaluate indigenous knowledge without dismissing it outright or accepting its veracity uncritically, but duly evaluating it on merit, regardless of cultural significance.

References

Henry, Oakeley (2023). Modern Medicines from Plants: Botanical histories of some of modern medicine’s most important drugs. London: CRC Press.

Schwarcz, Joseph (April 5, 2024). “Sordid Medicine Shows Exploited Indigenous Cures American settlers capitalized on Indigenous Peoples’ long history of using plants to treat ailments.” McGill University, Montreal, Canada, Office for Science and Society, accessed at: https://www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/medical-history/sordid-medicine-shows-exploited-indigenous-cures?utm_source=chatgpt.com3.

Singh, Inder (1955). “Reserpine In Hypertension.” The British Medical Journal 1, no. 4917 (1955): 813-17.

Burbank, Victoria (2017). The Embodiment of Sorcery: Supernatural Aggression, Belief and Envy in a Remote Aboriginal Community. The Australian Journal of Anthropology 28: 286-300; Maher, Patrick (1999). “A Review of ‘Traditional’ Aboriginal Health Beliefs.” The Australian Journal of Rural Health 7(4):229-236 (November).

Gall, Alana et al. (2018). “Traditional and Complementary Medicine Use Among Indigenous Cancer Patients in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States: A Systematic Review.” Integrative Cancer Therapies 17(3):568-581.

Witt, Charles (2003). “The Health and Controversial Death of George Washington.” Ear, Nose & Throat Journal 80(2):102, 104-105; Stephen, Ruiz (2023). “A Medical Mystery Almost as Old as America: What Actually Killed George Washington?” Military.com, September 11, accessed at: https://www.military.com/history/medical-mystery-almost-old-america-what-actually-killed-george-washington.html7.

Stahl, William H. (1937). “Moon Madness.” Annals of Medical History 9(3):248-263. See p. 263.

“Change 2 – Equal status for mātauranga Māori in NCEA,” New Zealand Ministry of Education, Curriculum Centre, 2025, accessed at: https://ncea.education.govt.nz/change-2-equal-status-matauranga-maori-ncea9.

“Energetic Young Leaders’ Debate: Next Generation of Politicians make their Case.” Newshub (TV 3 New Zealand), August 12, 2023, accessed at: https:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYzuCIH_98I10.

“Revitalising Māori Astronomy.” Documentary “Rakaunui. Full Moon. Garden Today but Don’t Fish.” Scottie Productions (Auckland, New Zealand). June 17, 2016. Part of the Curious Minds New Zealand Government initiative led by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, the Ministry of Education and the Office of the Prime Minister’s Chief Science Advisor, accessed at: https://www.sciencelearn.org.nz/resources/1274-revitalising-maori-astronomy11.

“Guided by Hine te Iwaiwa: Exploring Maramataka Influence on Pregnancy Outcomes.” The Health Research Council of New Zealand, summary of research grant covering 2024-2026, accessed at: https://www.hrc.govt.nz/resources/research-repository/guided-hine-te-iwaiwa-exploring-maramataka-influence-pregnancy

Londero, Ambrogio et al. (2024). “Exploring the mystical relationship between the Moon, Sun, and birth rate.” BioMed Central Pregnancy and Childbirth 24(1):454.

Elder, Hinemoa (2022). Wawata Moon Dreaming: Daily Wisdom Guided by Hina the Māori Moon. Auckland, New Zealand: Penguin Random House, pp. 78 and 129.

Parahi, Carmen (2020). “The Ancient Māori Healing System that is Making Waves.” Stuff (New Zealand), January 19, accessed at: https://hapuhauora.health.nz/highlights/the-ancient-maori-healing-system-that-is-making-waves15.

Collins, Heeni (2021). “Te Maramataka: A Way to Live and Know.” AKO: The Journal of the New Zealand Educational Institute Te Riu Roa. Summer, accessed at: https://akojournal.org.nz/2021/01/13/te-maramataka/16.

Botting, Susan (2024). “Far North Mayor Moko Tepania to Graduate from University of Waikato with Master of Education Degree.” Northern Advocate, April 16, accessed at: https://www.nzherald.co.nz/northern-advocate/news/far-north-mayor-moko-tepania-to-graduate-from-university-of-waikato-with-a-master-of-education/BDAS3D3UEFDXPH6MEMUFCMXEDI/

This article was originally published by RealClearScience and made available via RealClearWire.

1 picture worth just 15 words could change the entire Virginia governor’s race

Virginia Lt. Gov. Winsome Sears

While the expression is “a picture is worth a thousand words,” as the race for Virginia’s next governor heats up, could it be worth only 15?

That’s not due to inflation. It’s just that sometimes, 15 words may be all that are needed to change the course of history.

But before we discuss those 15 words, for some perspective, let’s look at how just 14 words changed history in Virginia’s last governor’s race exactly four years ago.

The 14 words I refer to are those that former Democrat Gov. Terry McAuliffe used in his ill-fated debate answer on Sept. 28, 2021, as he was running for a second term as governor: “I don’t think parents have the right to tell schools what they should teach.”

Those 14 words cost him the 2021 election (which polls had him leading by a larger margin than Democrat gubernatorial nominee Abigail Spanberger is currently leading Republican nominee Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears by).

Those words might have cost him more than that, because it’s not a stretch to imagine that a two-term Democrat governor of a “purple” state with a Bill and Hillary Clinton pedigree—not to mention a ton of campaign cash—could have been the frontrunner in the race to be the Democrats’ presidential nominee in 2028.

That was all done in by just 14 words—and McAuliffe’s insistence that he could not, or would not, walk away from them.

Today, the picture we refer to as being worth 15 words is the photograph of a pro-“transgender” activist protesting outside of an Arlington County School Board meeting where Sears was speaking out against the school system allowing boys in girls bathrooms. The sign the protester was carrying said: “Hey Winsome! If trans can’t share your bathroom, then blacks can’t share my water fountain!”

Was just sent a picture of this person with this sign outside of Arlington’s school board meeting. pic.twitter.com/Ie0UC84jxR

— Brandon Jarvis (@Jaaavis) August 21, 2025

That image is still circling social media a week and a half later.

Though not wearing any Spanberger campaign identification, her shirt was emblazoned on the front with the acronym “WofA,” which stands for  We of Action, a group that has canvassed for Spanberger and is promoting a September canvassing event in support of the Democrat on its website.

The protester’s white hair indicated that she might be old enough to at least have been taught about the segregation that was rampant in Virginia that led to the Democrat-led “Massive Resistance” in 1956. That was what it was called when the state closed schools in Norfolk, Charlottesville, and Front Royal rather than desegregate them in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Brown vs. Board of Education ruling declaring segregation was against the law.

Since the photograph of the sign became public, Spanberger’s lead in recent polls has been cut in half, even though she strongly criticized it. One recent poll has Sears now only trailing by just 5% and within the margin of error.

Spanberger posted to her X account Aug. 23: “The sign displayed in Arlington last night was racist and abhorrent. Many Virginians remember the segregated water fountains (and buses and schools and neighborhoods) of Virginia’s recent history. And no matter the intended purpose or tone and no matter how much one might find someone else’s beliefs objectionable, to threaten a return of Jim Crow and segregation to a Black woman is unacceptable. Full stop.”

She has not addressed it since, but it puts her ahead of McAuliffe, who kept doubling down on his feelings about parents in 2021.

Since the incident, Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin has begun weighing more into the election, sending out campaign fundraising tweets and emails and appearing at joint events with the Republican candidates.

Additionally, Robert Johnson, the founder of Black Entertainment Television, did what few have been willing to do for the Sears campaign: contribute money—$500,000 to be exact—the lifeblood of any campaign. Will that lead to more?

Since then, Sears’ campaign coffers have swollen to $11miilion, according to the Virginia Public Access Project. It’s still less than half of the Spanberger war chest but growing.

Is this incident enough for Sears to turn things around, or is it too late? It occurred a month earlier than McAuliffe’s ill-fated statement in September 2021, and his polling lead was larger at the time. Taken together, that means this race may be closer than people think.

[Editor’s note: This story originally was published by The Daily Signal.]

Jewish teachers fighting unions in court

Jewish teachers, fed up with their own unions’ spate of anti-Semitic actions in recent years, notched a win this summer when the National Education Association reversed a decision to sever ties with the Anti-Defamation League.

The victory, while gratifying for these educators, is hardly the norm. Jewish teachers say they’ve been forced into defending their support for Israel or fighting against discrimination for expressing their views in public schools that have become bastions of anti-Jewish rhetoric. This troubling development has occurred against a backdrop of labor unions straying from the mission of representing teachers in workplace negotiations, while morphing into politically partisan organizations agitating for a variety of progressive causes.

Jewish teachers are now engaged in legal battles on multiple fronts and in several cities across the country where teachers unions have supported anti-Israeli mantras and causes amid international division over the war in Gaza.

The NEA, the nation’s largest teachers union with nearly 3 million members, recently walked back a proposed boycott of the ADL, which has fought anti-Semitism as well as other forms of bigotry for more than a century. The ADL has also long provided anti-discrimination curriculum and highly regarded Holocaust teaching materials to as many as 2,000 schools nationwide.

NEA President Becky Pringle said NEA’s board of directors voted not to implement the proposal after consulting with NEA state affiliates and civil rights leaders, including Jewish American and Arab Americans community leaders, as well as ADL’s leadership.

“There is no doubt that anti-Semitism is on the rise. Without equivocation, NEA stands strongly against anti-Semitism,” Pringle said in a statement after the union’s reversal on ADL. “We always have, and we always will. Our Jewish students and educators deserve nothing less.”

“We know anti-Semitism and anti-Arab bigotry are very real and urgent problems in this country and around the world,” she added. “They are insidious forms of hate, which is why NEA and our members actively work to fight them in our classrooms, on our campuses, and in our communities.”

The NEA’s reversal came after an outcry by numerous Jewish groups, including the NEA’s Jewish Affairs Caucus, which sent a letter to Pringle taking issue with a member-backed proposal to sever ties with the ADL and detailing harassment of Jewish teachers at the NEA conference in Portland, Oregon, in early July.

NEA delegates at the Portland conference adopted a measure to bar the use or endorsement of any ADL materials including Holocaust curricula, statistics, and programs. Because it was a “sanction item,” it required referral to the NEA executive committee, which decided to reject the vote by the 7,000-member representative body.

Yet there were signs of trouble even before the proposed ADL boycott. Jewish educators took issue with the way NEA depicted the Holocaust in its 2025 member handbook – without mentioning Jews, but instead referencing victims “from different faiths” and stating that Israel was founded through “forced violent displacement and dispossession.”

After the Portland conference, Jewish delegates who attended complained that they were mocked, harassed, and threatened at the event in “ways that dishonor our union,” the NEA Jewish Affairs Caucus wrote in its letter to Pringle.

The caucus reported that other delegates laughed and clapped as a Jewish delegate from Colorado referenced the death of Karen Diamond, an 82-year-old Holocaust survivor who was burned alive by a Molotov cocktail during a demonstration in Boulder on June 30.

The union’s choice to hold its conference in Portland, a city known for racial riots organized by Antifa militants, demonstrated little concern for dissenting Jewish members. Portland’s public schools have become hotbeds of pro-Palestinian and anti-Israeli protests over the last two years. In May, a Portland high school math teacher who is an Israeli Jew, sued the city’s school district, teachers union, and school board, arguing that they discriminated against him by distributing and promoting anti-Semitic and pro-Palestinian material and messaging, without a “balanced perspective.”

The teacher, identified in the suit as John Doe out of “fear for his physical safety,” alleged that the Portland Association of Teachers worked with Oregon Educators for Palestine to co-publish guides called
“Teach Palestine!” and “Know Your Rights!” and held training sessions in which teachers learned how to “teach and advocate for Palestine within Portland Public Schools.”

Jewish leaders, teachers, and parents in Portland last year took issue with the Portland Association of Teachers hosting of a pro-Palestinian advocacy meeting in which organizers encouraged teachers to display Palestinian flags in their classrooms, wear T-shirts emblazoned with pro-Palestinian messages, and teach lessons on the war in Gaza that critics argue are inaccurate and anti-Semitic.

The suit referred to one of the union’s lesson plans for elementary children that describes the state of Israel as a “group of bullies called Zionists.” The curricula focused on the death and upheaval experienced by Palestinians without mentioning that the Israel-Hamas war began with the unprovoked slaughter of 1,200 Jews, most of them civilians, on Oct. 7, 2023.

The teacher’s lawsuit said his school became a “forum for one-sided, anti-Israel rhetoric,” with the administration allowing the posting of Palestinian flags and maps of Palestine that eliminated the state of Israel. He said he asked if he could display the Israeli flag but was rebuked and told it would be “too disruptive,” according to the lawsuit.

In late July, seven Jewish teachers in the Los Angeles Unified School District renewed their fight against a California law that compels them to be represented by the United Teachers Los Angeles, exclusively, in all bargaining and workplace protection matters. Under the law, the UTLA must represent all teachers in the Los Angeles Unified School District, even those, such as this group of Jewish teachers, who have severed ties and stopped paying dues because of what they view as anti-Semitic positions the local union has taken over the course of several years.

The lawsuit lists the members of the California Public Employee Relations Board and LAUSD Superintendent Albert Carvalho as defendants.

“My parents on my mom’s side were Holocaust survivors. Grandmother was in the camp and grandfather was in the forest [hiding],” Barry Blisten, one of the plaintiffs in the suit, told RealClearPolitics. “My grandpa used to say, ‘It could happen again – you need to be careful.’ I thought he was crazy to say that in America. I was first generation. But he was so right. Everything is cyclical.”

On July 21,U.S. District Court Judge Stephen Wilson dismissed the First Amendment religious freedom case, citing precedent that determined that a group of members within the union that has been designated as the exclusive bargaining representative cannot reject the UTLA and find an alternative. The judge referred to a previous Supreme Court decision in a Minnesota case that determined that a group of community college faculty members who wanted to seek an alternative representative from the union couldn’t do so, because the union’s position as the sole collective bargaining representative hadn’t infringed on the faculty group’s freedom to speak on any education or related issue or “associate or not associate with whom they please.”

Blisten and the other plaintiffs with the support of the Freedom Foundation, a free-market conservative think tank based in Washington State, have since appealed, vowing to fight the issue all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which has taken up several issues involving religious freedom in public schools this year.

The UTLA didn’t respond to RCP’s request for comment.

Blisten argues that his problems with the UTLA began six years ago when a group called Union Power seized control of UTLA’s leadership and started pushing divisive social and political agendas instead of focusing on teacher welfare, wage increases, and tenure protections.

The new leaders endorsed the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement and voted for the immediate cessation of U.S. aid to Israel. Over the years, Blisten said the hostility toward Jewish members became more and more overt, with Jewish teachers systematically removed from online Zoom meetings for simply questioning positions they believed were anti-Semitic.

Even before the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre, UTLA President Cecily Myart-Cruz referred to Los Angeles’ Museum of Tolerance, which teaches about the Holocaust, as “the enemy.” The plaintiffs argue that more recently the UTLA used member dues to subsidize anti-Semitic school board candidates, curriculum, and rhetoric.

Just a month after the Oct. 7 attack, UTLA’s Political Action Council of Educators endorsed school board candidate Kahllid Al-Alim and spent more than $700,000 backing his candidacy. Jewish teachers pointed to numerous anti-Semitic posts on Al-Alim’s social media accounts, including one in which he calls the Nation of Islam Book, “The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews,” “mandatory reading in community schools.”

According to the ADL, the book blames Jews for promoting a myth of black racial inferiority and makes conspiratorial accusations about Jewish involvement in the slave trade and the cotton, textile, and banking industries.

On his campaign website, Al-Alim later issued an apology for endorsing the book.

“I was wrong. I have connected with educators and community members and have since learned about the issues,” he said. “I fully rescind that post. It has no place in our schools.”

Still, the disclosure prompted the UTLA to rescind its endorsement and immediately cease campaigning for Al-Alim, who lost his election in November.

Blisten describes an incident in which UTLA members were on a Zoom conference call, where one member used expletives and disparaging language when discussing Jews and the war in Gaza.

Jewish teachers then interjected, arguing that such expressions are deeply offensive.

“Then they systematically kicked the Jewish teachers who were raising concerns out of the meeting, because that’s what they do,” he said. “I mean, it’s a microcosm of our government here in California, especially Los Angeles. There’s no accountability, and as soon as you ask the hard question, they dodge it or don’t answer. So, this is where we’re at.”

The UTLA isn’t really acting like a union anymore, Blisten added.

“They’re aligning themselves with so many different [political] organizations, instead of concentrating on teacher issues. I mean, it’s crazy.”

This article was originally published by RealClearPolitics and made available via RealClearWire.

Where is the Russia-Ukraine war heading?

The interior of a building in Kiev, Ukraine, is clearly visible during the Russian invasion of Ukraine in March 2022. (Video screenshot)

The conflict between Russia and Ukraine continues to rage, with no resolution in sight.

With peace talks stalled, Russian drones recently targeted Ukrainian power infrastructure in both northern and southern regions, cutting electricity to approximately 60,000 people. In response, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy promised counterstrikes far beyond Russian’s borders.

After three and a half years of war, questions linger about potential paths to peace, while concerns continue to mount over how much the American military should be involved. Last month, President Donald Trump said a peace deal with Russia would not include deploying U.S. troops to Ukraine’s borders.

Retired U.S. Army Lt. Col. Darin Gaub, a former UH-60 Black Hawk pilot and battalion commander, agrees with the president, telling Fox News “‘boots on the ground’ in Ukraine is not necessary.”

WorldNetDaily spoke to Gaub in-depth to flesh out what is really happening right now in the Russia-Ukraine war – and America’s involvement.

“Trump’s primary leverage – one that he’s been using lately – is economic,” Gaub explained. “The key thing the U.S. can do is tie ourselves to Ukraine economically and help them use their own resources to build themselves up economically and rebuild their own country.” By doing that, he said, the Eastern European country could rebuild its military and take a formidable stance against Russia.

“The challenge in this conflict is that Russia saw this coming for years and built an alliance and economic system to survive the inevitable sanctions,” Gaub explained to WND. “Not only did he invest heavily in golds and silvers, but he also tied himself closely to China and Iran.” As the retired Army officer explained, “Through these nations, he’s still able to sell energy and fuel his economy and war industry.”

Additionally, Gaub considers it “unfortunate” that “Trump has placed around himself some bad actors providing equally bad advice.”

Despite these setbacks, it still appears only the weight of American influence could compel Vladimir Putin to change his course of action. “This takes time and there has to be some security guarantees in order to make this possible,” said Gaub. “A calculated discussion about the use of intelligence assets – space and airborne – could enforce a no-fly zone, for example.” But, he added, “To think you need to have U.S. troops patrolling some sort of demilitarized zone between Russia and Ukraine is absolutely ridiculous and should never happen.”

“Sadly,” Gaub explained to WND, “European politicians talk one way to Trump, and act another way at home. They are content to let Ukraine fight on until the last standing Ukrainian.” Why? “Too many European nations still benefit economically from the war,” said Gaub, “and continue to make unrealistic demands that serve only to keep the war going, such as refusing to accept that Ukraine would have to make land concessions and that the Crimea be recognized as Russian.”

“Ukraine is not in a good place militarily,” Gaub pointed out, noting that “continuing to destroy Russian oil infrastructure will only serve to push Russia into a corner where they will fight harder.”

“History is full of lessons that teach us the things we shouldn’t do, but it seems many are attempting to recreate history in hopes this time it will work out differently,” Gaub said. He concluded on an idealistic note: “Ultimately, I hope this war ends soon and we are able to see nations elevate each other through economic interchange and trade, rather than looking at each other as opponents.”

Gaub is also the author of VERITAS VINCIT: A Soldier’s Perspective on Truth, Faith, Family, and Freedom.”

Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate, WND earns from qualifying purchases. Purchasing through our affiliate links helps support WorldNetDaily with commissions at no extra cost to you.

Running out the clock on Vladimir Putin

Vladimir Putin

On July 14th, President Donald Trump set a deadline for Russian President Vladimir Putin to end the war in Ukraine – 50 days. The war’s death toll and the Russian leader’s bad faith negotiating tactics had exceeded the president’s patience threshold and it was time for the Trump Administration to weigh in more heavily than it had thus far. President Trump threatened sanctions and secondary sanctions if Putin didn’t stop the conflict, offering increased military support to Ukraine as well. Putin was on the clock!

Two weeks later, an important change took place when Trump accelerated the timeline. It was that pressure-packed strategy that quickly brought Putin to the negotiating table. It was also a potent sign of what works to influence the Russian president – urgent and looming economic pressure. According to their own central bank, the Russian economy is in a dismal condition and its future outlook is bleak. Trump’s threatened economic penalties, coupled with a tight timeline, forced Putin to alter his decision-making processes in a way that nothing had thus far.

Much ink has been used to opine on the outcomes of the Alaska Summit. It was undoubtedly a chance for Putin to bask in the glory of a meeting with President Trump while hoping to reset the clock and return to his warmaking activities without the pressure of a deadline. While there is very little known about the detailed discussions of the closed-door meetings, there are a few key takeaways that are a natural manifestation of such an engagement. First, President Trump had a chance to express his disdain for the on-going conflict, while threatening very severe consequences if it didn’t end soon. Second, President Trump had the opportunity to hear from Putin, who likely expressed some level of commitment to end the war to please his host.

The meeting that took place the following Monday between President Trump, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and European Union and NATO leaders was a powerful sign of unity among allies and partners. Statements about iron-clad security guarantees further demonstrated tight-knit cooperation and long-term commitment. Yet, the most significant outcome may have been the opportunity to firmly shift responsibility back to Russia to prove a willingness to negotiate and act in good faith. Since then, Putin has done just the opposite.

The last two weeks have seen Russia negotiating and acting in a particularly extreme version of bad faith. Putin’s government has made statements refusing a bilateral meeting with Zelenskyy and demanding a veto of any security guarantees or subsequent security assistance to Ukraine. Russia has increased strikes on civilian targets and even destroyed a U.S. civilian factory in western Ukraine. Every bad faith statement and action demonstrates disrespect to the President of the United States and likely proves that Putin blatantly lied to President Trump in Alaska. Meanwhile, the clock ticks on and the death toll rises.

It’s worth a bit of detour to another clock with another timeline that was directed towards another adversary – those related to Iran’s nuclear program earlier this year. President Trump set an ambitious timeline – 60 days. While the timeline pressure, coupled with snapback sanctions that would destroy Iran’s economy, were enough to bring Iran to the negotiating table, their bad faith negotiating tactics scuttled success while demonstrating disrespect to the President of the United States. Without fanfare, the timeline ticked away. And on the 61st day, Iran suffered the consequences of their failure to meet Trump’s clearly defined deadline.

President Trump has allowed the summit follow-up between Russia and Ukraine to play out without utilizing American leverage. He continues to make statements lamenting the ongoing death toll of the war and about the possibility of stepping away from the mediator role. Yet, at the same time, he has implied something far more important – that we will all see what happens in the next week or two. After all, a clearly defined deadline remains and the clock is ticking away without fanfare. The earliest of those comments was given two weeks ago, and the 51st day from the original deadline arrives on September 3rd. The clock is running out for President Putin.

Timelines, pressure, and strength resonate with Putin. So do economic threats and looming costs. The imposition of sanctions and secondary sanctions on September 3rd would provide a powerful signal – to Putin and to others. Stall tactics, bad faith negotiating, and deception may work for a while, but not when the clock runs out. In the case of Ukraine, increasing weapons sales, removing weapon system limitations, and even considering the distribution to Ukraine of the 300 billion dollars in seized Russian Central Bank funds are all ways to punctuate the credibility of President Trump, the United States of America, and the clearly defined timelines that were established nearly 50 days ago. Tick-tock Vladimir!

Brig. Gen. John Teichert (U.S. Air Force, ret.) is a leading expert on foreign affairs and military strategy. He served as commander of Joint Base Andrews and Edwards Air Force Base, was the U.S. senior defense official to Iraq, and recently retired as the assistant deputy undersecretary of the Air Force for international affairs. A prolific author and speaker, he can be followed at johnteichert.com  and on  LinkedIn .

This article was originally published by RealClearDefense and made available via RealClearWire.