News:
SMF - Just Installed!
- Welcome to THeBlueCashew.
This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.
#1
The Flea Trap / Cost of living, rising inflation
March 22, 2022, 09:27:17 PM #2
The Flea Trap / Berkeley students pledge money to help Taliban murder Americans
October 24, 2021, 10:27:40 AM #3
The Flea Trap / This heat wave
June 28, 2021, 02:20:39 PM #4
The Flea Trap / Arabs from enemy states ask to serve in IDF
January 06, 2021, 09:58:57 PM #5
The Flea Trap / 100, 000 could make aliyah due to global crisis
April 26, 2020, 12:24:05 PMHerzog called for the government and aliyah-oriented groups to prepare for "a major wave of immigration to Israel when the corona crisis ends, as happened in the past after many crises in Jewish communities around the world since the establishment of the state."
The Agency's hopes are based on the number of inquiries they have received recently regarding the possibility of immigrating. The first group consists of 60,000 citizens who left the country years ago and have expressed an interest in returning as soon as possible.
The rest are people who have asked about making Israel their home for the first time, with the expectation that the 2020 figure would beat the decade-high number of 35,000 who immigrated in 2019.
Last month in the UK, for example, 500 people inquired about aliyah when the annual number of British immigrants is usually around 700. And in France, said Makor Rishon, some 1,000 families are currently preparing to come to Israel.
Israel's well-publicized relative success in battling the pandemic is one reason for the high-level interest, said Herzog.
This is good and bad. Most of those who will make aliyah are from rich countries, they are professionals and they have the resources to support themselves. On the other hand, this will make Israel's housing shortage much worse.
#6
The Flea Trap / Netanyahu ‘gradually’ rolls back coronavirus restrictions
April 18, 2020, 04:29:55 PMOn Saturday evening, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the nation, announcing the beginning of Israel's plan to lift restrictions put in place to stop the spread of the coronavirus.
Specifically, Netanyahu announced a 10-point plan to relax nationwide restrictions on businesses, stores and gatherings for sports and prayer.
In addition to introducing a "purple badge" safety certification process for businesses that seek to reopen, Netanyahu also increased the percentage of employees (30 percent) permitted at workplaces and announced certain types of freestanding stores will be permitted to reopen, including those that sell appliances, household goods, and eye glasses, among others. Malls and open-air markets will remain closed.
Under the new regulations, sports will also be permitted in pairs and outdoor public prayers in groups of up to 10 will also be permitted, provided worshipers maintain distances of at least two meters (six feet).
The Cabinet will vote on the measures on Saturday night, and is expected to approve the steps. It appears that the new rules will take effect either Sunday or Monday.
Netanyahu lauded Israel for its response to the COVID-19 pandemic, which has received praise in the "coronavirus war," comparing its statistics to those of countries hit far harder by the deadly virus.
Netanyahu also referenced attempts to form a unity government with his political rival Benny Gantz, in addition to making an appeal to Israeli citizens who observe Ramadan to limit gatherings to immediate family.
Siman-Tov also requested that Israelis over the age of 67 not return to work, reiterating Netanyahu's comments about protecting senior citizens and the facilities in which they live.
Siman-Tov added that Israelis must continue to observe social distancing requirements and wash hands regularly, in addition to other necessary precautions such as wearing face masks in public places.
Both Netanyahu an Siman-Tov warned that Israelis would see a return to stricter restrictions if the rate of infections spikes or workplaces refuse to adhere to the new regulations.
As of Saturday evening, there were over 13,200 cases of coronavirus in Israel, with 164 deaths.
Prior to Passover, Israel instituted a nationwide curfew on the first night of the holiday and a travel ban that prevented gatherings of people who did not currently reside in the same dwelling. This left a significant number of Israelis spending the Passover seder by themselves on a night that is traditionally a time for large family gatherings.
It's still restrictive, but it's a start. British Columbia needs to start opening up soon too.
#7
The Flea Trap / Evidence points back to Wuhan lab, not wet market, as source of COVID-19
April 16, 2020, 03:43:30 PMSources told Fox News that evidence points to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, based on "classified and open-source documents and evidence."
The virus was not grown as a bioweapon but as part of an effort by China to show that it was just as capable as the U.S. in combating viruses, multiple sources told Fox News.
The Daily Mail similarly reported that "The Wuhan lab was originally set up with assistance from the French and American governments, but in recent years the Chinese have rebuffed international assistance there and tried to prove their ability to work independently."
Safety procedures were sloppy at the lab. U.S. Embassy officials warned in January 2018 about poor safety protocols, noting in particular risky studies linked with coronavirus pathogens in bats, The Washington Post reported on Wednesday.
The Fox report noted that the sources stressed that the intelligence isn't definite. "Some inside the administration and the intelligence and epidemiological communities are more skeptical, and the investigation is continuing," the report said.
It came from a lab in Wuhan.
#8
The Guest Nest / Spam
April 11, 2020, 07:50:00 PMWould Cronus and Fashionista consider putting those threads in miscellaneous thread deraliment or at least consolidate them in one thread. Threads worth reading are getting bumped off the first page.
#9
The Flea Trap / Health professor: Corona hysteria doing more damage than epidemic
April 10, 2020, 10:09:51 PMA former director of Israel's health ministry and member of Knesset said Monday the "monstrous hysteria" over the coronavirus pandemic is doing more damage to the country than the virus itself.
Prof. Yoram Lass of Tel Aviv University said a letter that he and a dozen colleagues sent last week to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was ignored. The health experts wrote that the strict closures of schools and much of the economy would cause Israel's morbidity rate to go up and over time would result in more deaths than from the coronavirus epidemic.
"There is a monstrous hysteria like in the rest of the world" that was being driven by panic in the media.
"This is the first time that a medical epidemic has been accompanied by a social media epidemic," Lass told World Israel News.
Under the strict closures ordered by the government to prevent the spread of the virus, the education system was shut down and most Israelis have been restricted to their homes. In the space of a few weeks the unemployment rate has skyrocketed to a staggering 25 percent and there are fears of long-term damage to Israel's economy.
In a Channel 13 interview last week, Lass and colleague Prof. Asher Elhayani pointed to a European study that showed that any 1 percent increase in the unemployment rate leads to a 0.4 percent increase in population mortality. Elyahani said the drop in standard of living results in a rise in depression, suicide and other factors that adversely affect public health.
"The number of people likely to die as a result of quarantine, unemployment, poverty and loneliness will be infinitely greater than the number of deaths expected from the virus," the letter stated.
The professors said there is no data to support the claim that the coronavirus epidemic compares to the 20th-century Spanish influenza pandemic. Keeping healthy people at home who are not in high-risk groups was damaging the country, they stressed.
Elyani said he wasn't advising to remove the conditions totally, but to be smarter in battling the epidemic by concentrating on those who were more susceptible.
He recommended immediately reopening schools while keeping older staff at home because they are in a more susceptible age group.
Lass and Elhayani, a member of the Israel National Institute For Health Policy Research, said the 585 Israelis who have already recovered from the virus could go back to work immediately with no problems.
Lass said the mass hysteria was driving the politicians and public to take drastic, unneeded actions because they were expecting the worst case scenarios to happen.
A total lockdown doesn't seem rational.
#10
The Guest Nest / Middle East Respiratory Syndrome
March 22, 2020, 12:18:24 PM #11
The Guest Nest / Thanks to China, I am unemployed
March 18, 2020, 08:08:39 PM #12
The Guest Nest / Funniest poster on BC
March 07, 2020, 07:18:34 PM-Blurt
-Odinson, he is so sarcastic
-Blazor
-Shen Li
-Biggie Smiles
-Dinky Dazza
-cc
-Fashionista, see thread titled I am becoming everything that I hate...
-Herman, I thought the shine my shitter thing was comical
Anybody else. And who is the funniest.
#13
The Flea Trap / The Israel–U.S. Model Has Been a Resounding Success
January 24, 2020, 05:31:28 PMBefore 2002, during the various Palestinian intifadas, Israel suffered hundreds of deaths and thousands of injuries from suicide bombers freely crossing from the West Bank and Gaza into Israel.
In response, Israel planned a vast border barrier. The international community was outraged. The Israeli left called the idea nothing short of "apartheid."
However, after the completion of the 440-mile border barrier — part concrete well, part wire fencing — suicide bombings and terrorist incursions into Israel declined to almost nil.
The wall was not entirely responsible for enhanced Israeli security. But it freed up border manpower to patrol more vigorously. The barrier also was integrated with electronic surveillance and tougher laws against illegal immigration.
The wall also brought strategic and political clarity. Those who damned Israel but freely crossed its borders sounded incoherent when they became furious that the barrier prevented access to the hated Zionist entity.
The Trump administration is currently seeking funds to create new border walls and replace old, porous fencing in order to stem illegal immigration on the southern border.
The strategy seems similar: The wall will free up manpower for better border policing. It likewise provides a certain political clarity. The United States is often criticized by Mexico and other Latin American countries. It is now being taken to task for the effort to make it more difficult to illegally enter such a supposedly unwelcome and hostile landscape.
For years, Israel's great weakness was its dependence on imported energy, while its neighboring enemies grew rich exporting oil and natural gas. Yet in the last decade, Israel has ramped up production to take advantage of its vast natural-gas reserves — to the point that it is not just self-sufficient in fossil fuels but soon will become a major exporter.
Now, Israel cannot be threatened economically by either Iran or various Persian Gulf monarchies. Its economy is stronger than ever. Europeans suddenly are more accommodating, given that Israel may well become a natural-gas exporter to a fuel-hungry Europe.
Like Israel, but unlike Europe, the U.S. was eager to frack and horizontally drill to tap vast new fossil-fuel reserves. The change in U.S. strategic energy independence is similarly astounding.
America is now the largest producer of natural gas and oil in the world. Its output has increased world supply, dropped prices, and hurt America's oil-exporting enemies.
The relative power of Russia and Middle Eastern nations, such as Iran, over U.S. decision-making has radically diminished — along with the need to station huge numbers of American troops in the volatile Middle East.
As in Israel, opponents either argued that more drilling would ruin the environment or that it would not work. They seem to be wrong on both counts.
Israel's foreign policy could be called Jacksonian. Israel allies with friends, neutrals, and former enemies whenever they share particular strategic goals.
In the topsy-turvy Middle East, Israel is now sometimes a strategic partner with formerly hostile regimes in Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and other Gulf monarchies. They all share greater fears of theocratic Iran and its terrorist appendages in Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen.
Apparently, much of the Arab world is no longer as interested in the Palestinian desire to destroy Israel. Many Palestinian groups are allied with a despised Iran, while many Arabs believe that Israel's strength can sometimes be strategically useful.
Current American realism is similar. The U.S. is neither isolationist nor an interventionist nation-builder. Its foreign-policy goals are to enhance its military, expand its already powerful economy, limit its strategic exposure, and bank its resulting hard and soft power to use only as a deterrent force against those who kill Americans or endanger U.S. interests.
Instead of cajoling allies to join us in expeditionary wars abroad, the U.S. increasingly appears reluctant to intervene, especially in the Middle East. As a result, former critics are now becoming suppliants requesting U.S. assistance.
As with Israel, the U.S. is less eager to apply political litmus tests to its occasional allies. It also seeks to avoid quagmires where its overwhelming conventional firepower can be neutralized by terrorists and urban guerrillas.
The promoters of these unconventional policies, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. president Donald Trump, are both despised by their respective establishments and under constant threat of removal by their livid political opponents.
Yet they both have transformed their respective countries. Their policies remind us that it is sometimes preferable to be respected rather than just be liked — and that when a nation is strong and does not beg for help, it often finds more than it needs.
Trump and Bibi are similar leaders. Tiny Israel and huge America are similar countries with similar challenges.
#14
The Flea Trap / Israel becomes major energy exporter after signing Egypt gas permit
December 17, 2019, 10:38:04 PMEnergy Minister Yuval Steinitz called the permit a "historic landmark" for Israel. He said it's the most significant economic cooperation project between the neighboring countries since they signed a peace deal in 1979.
The European Union, seeking to reduce its dependence on Russian gas, has encouraged the formation of new delivery routes, including through the eastern Mediterranean. These routes could also curtail Iranian ambitions to use Syria as a gateway to the Mediterranean.
"The natural gas revolution turns us into an energy power and affords us not just huge income for the country but also a dramatic decrease in air pollution," Steinitz said. Israel is planning to wean itself off coal, thanks to the expected gas boon.
$15 Billion Deal
Aside from the economic benefits, the promise of gas appears to have helped Israel grow closer to Arab governments and other Mediterranean countries.
Israel signed a $15 billion deal last year to provide Egypt with 64 billion cubic meters of gas over a 10-year period that will help transform both into regional energy players.
In January, Egypt hosted its first ever regional gas forum. The Israeli energy minister attended alongside several regional delegations, the first such visit by an Israeli Cabinet member since 2011.
Although past economic agreements with Israel have been controversial in Egypt, where support for the Palestinians runs high, relations have been steadily warming.
Israel already delivers small quantities of gas to the Palestinians and to Jordan, with whom Delek and Noble signed their first export agreement in 2016.
The Leviathan reservoir was discovered in 2010 some 125 kilometers (75 miles) off the Israeli coast, and together with the discovery of the smaller Tamar field, ushered in a wave of optimism for Israel with regard to its energy needs.
The Zohr gas field — discovered off the coast of Egypt in 2015 — has been touted as the largest ever in the Mediterranean.
It took Israel a mere four years to go from discovery to major export delivery.
#15
The Flea Trap / Do you think a consumer carbon tax in Canada will have any effect on the earth's climate?
December 17, 2019, 10:16:33 PM #16
The Flea Trap / Ilhan Omar accused of spying for Qatar, information passed to Iran
November 27, 2019, 10:35:59 PMAccording to the Jerusalem Post, the accusations were made against Rep. Omar (pictured with CAIR Florida leader Hassan Shibly) during the "testimony by Kuwaiti-born Canadian businessman Alan Bender, who was giving evidence in the trial of Sheik Khalid bin-Hamad al-Thani" in the United States District Court of the Middle District of Florida.
The sworn testimony against Omar is damning.
Here is how the Jerusalem Post reported it"
According to his sworn deposition, the three officials told him: "If it wasn't for our cash, Ilhan Omar would be just another black Somali refugee in America collecting welfare and serving tables on weekends."
Qatar "recruited Ilhan Omar from even way before she thought about becoming a government official. [...] They groomed her and arranged the foundation, the grounds, for her to get into politics way before she even showed interest. They convinced her," he added.
"The best thing money can buy are American officials because they are the cheapest of the cheapest costing officials in the world," the Qatari officials were said to have told him.
So far only an accusation. But, it would not surprise me if it's true.
#17
The Flea Trap / ISIS in Sinai, sitting on Israel’s doorstep
November 03, 2019, 07:36:48 PMThe ISIS branch in Sinai posted pictures of about two dozen fighters standing among trees, with a caption saying they were pledging allegiance to the new leader.
The ISIS Sinai branch is a threat to both Israel and Egypt. ISIS has tried to attack Israel from Sinai but has failed due to Israel's intelligence capabilities.
The ISIS threat has led to unprecedented cooperation between Egypt and Israel to root out the terror group.
The New York Times reported in Feb. 2018, "For more than two years, unmarked Israeli drones, helicopters and jets have carried out a covert air campaign, conducting more than 100 airstrikes inside Egypt, frequently more than once a week — and all with the approval of President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi."
Egypt has been doing everything it can to crush an insurgency in Sinai that began with the overthrow of Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak in 2011. It started with a Bedouin insurrection and morphed into a group calling itself Sinai Province and declaring its fidelity to ISIS.
Violence escalated after Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood was brought down by Egypt's military in 2013.
Israel and Egypt will remain vigilante and work together against the ISIS threat.
#18
The Flea Trap / Michael Moore-backed film criticizes renewable energy
October 26, 2019, 02:40:36 PM"Planet of the Humans" is a new documentary directed by Jeff Gibbs, who produced "Bowling for Columbine." Mr. Moore is the film's executive producer, and the movie recently debuted at his Traverse City Film Festival in Michigan.
According to The Associated Press, the film asserts that environmentalists have oversold the benefits of renewable energy. Some of the film's findings are eye-opening.
Environmentalists point to Germany as a country that's doing it right, with more than 35 percent of its power coming from renewable sources. The movie finds, however, that 70 percent of the power Germany counts as renewable comes from biomass — a fancy term for burning trees. Biomass releases 50 percent more carbon dioxide than coal and more than three times as much as natural gas. Ironically, Germany receives carbon credits for every tree it burns.
Mr. Gibbs and Mr. Moore critique wind energy for requiring enormous amounts of copper and rare earth minerals. Wind farms also require developing large tracts of land. Solar energy gets dinged for its dependence on mining coal and quartz. They were even shocked to find a company owned by Charles and David Koch receiving solar tax credits. Electric cars sound great, but they depend on the fossil-fuel-powered electrical grid.
Even Al Gore gets dinged, with the film asserting that he's more focused on cashing in than saving the planet.
"It was kind of crushing to discover that the things I believed in weren't real," Mr. Gibbs told the AP. "Not only are the solar panels and wind turbines not going to save us ... but (also) that there is this whole dark side of the corporate money."
They aren't the only ones who've noticed that renewable energy is heavily dependent on things that aren't so renewable. Writing in The Wall Street Journal, Mark Mills notes that wind turbines and solar panels consist of nonrenewable parts. If enough solar panels are produced to meet the 2050 Paris Accords goals, the resulting waste will weigh more than twice as much as the world's current plastic waste. An electric-car battery requires extracting and processing more than 500,000 pounds of raw materials.
Poor Michael Moore. He has been mislead by leftist propaganda.
#19
The Flea Trap / Why is climate so important in Canada's election
October 19, 2019, 12:39:40 AM #20