“Illinois’ business tax climate would rank ahead of only California and New Jersey under a progressive tax. Hurt small businesses, and you hurt the jobs market”

Posted on March 10, 2019 by ArchitectGuy

ILLINOIS POLICY
Pritzker ‘fair tax’ would drop Illinois business climate to 48th in nation
by Joe Barnas
March 12, 2019

Under Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s progressive tax proposal, Illinois’ business tax climate ranking would plummet to 48th in the nation, beating out only California and New Jersey on the nonpartisan Tax Foundation’s State Business Tax Climate Index. That index measures state tax competitiveness and structure. It is especially concerning for Illinoisans seeking work, given that small businesses create nearly two-thirds of the state’s new jobs. “Were Pritzker’s proposal adopted, Illinois would trail its peers in just about every aspect of its tax code,” the Tax Foundation wrote. Illinois ranks 36th for its business tax climate without the progressive tax. READ MORE

CHICAGO TRIBUNE How Pritzker’s tax proposal sets up a pricey cliff and penalizes marriage When it says that the top rate would be 7.95 percent on net income over $1 million, you would expect that rate to apply to just the extra dollars of income above the $1 million mark. But that’s not how this proposal would work. For example, if net income goes above the $1 million threshold by just one dollar, that dollar plus the entire $1 million of income that would have been in the lower brackets, all gets pushed into the top bracket, where all of it would be taxed at 7.95 percent.

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“In recent weeks, signs are growing of an imminent explosion in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as the Israeli elections in April draw near”

Posted on March 8, 2019 by ArchitectGuy

JERUSALEM CENTER FOR PUBLIC AFFAIRS
Jordan and the Palestinian Authority Seek to Sabotage the Trump Peace Plan
by Yoni Ben Menachem
March 6, 2019

…Meanwhile, at the Gaza border and in the West Bank there are worrisome signs of escalation, and an outbreak on the Temple Mount could ignite these on a wide scale. Therefore, the order of the day is to calm the furies on the Temple Mount, which is of a sensitive religious nature for every Muslim. On the Gaza border, the “night confusion” units have been active again, attacking IDF soldiers along the border fence in the nighttime hours. Explosive-balloon and arson-balloon attacks on the Israeli communities along the border have resumed as well READ MORE

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Thomas Friedman and Ilhan Omar agree: We both don’t like AIPAC

Posted on March 8, 2019 by ArchitectGuy

JEWISH JOURNAL
Thomas Friedman Gets AIPAC Wrong
by David Suissa
March 8, 2019

…Apparently, in [Thomas] Friedman’s fantasy world, there’s no end to Aipac’s power. If only Aipac had taken on Netanyahu, if only they had attacked his right-wing policies that have resulted in “tens of thousands of Israeli settlers now ensconced in the heart of the West Bank,” maybe the Palestinian leaders would have come to their senses and a two-state solution would have been more likely. Never mind that there were already “tens of thousands of Israeli settlers” well before Netanyahu took office, and it was the Labor party not the Likud party that started the settlement enterprise in the first place. READ MORE

JEWISH INSIDER Responses to NYT’s “Is AIPAC Too Powerful?” Several questioned why the article retold well-reported tales from AIPAC’s past while all but ignoring the history of dual loyalty accusations and why they are problematic. Others were upset that the article featured an image of the South Florida activist donning phylacteries, something they contend was a ‘cheap ploy’ intended to portray him as something of a religious fanatic. One Twitter user also took the opportunity to complain that the ‘paper of record’ should refer to the group by its uppercase acronym AIPAC, not Aipac. But more troubling was that the story further exposed Stolberg’s eagerness to play sympathetic defender to the Democratic freshmen whom she’s supposed to be covering objectively.

JERUSALEM POST Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez says AIPAC is coming after her Not only is it not official, it’s not true.

TABLET MAG Armin Rosen: How Influential Is AIPAC? Less Than Beer Sellers, Public Accountants, and Toyota A list of lobbies and their spending may surprise Congresswoman Omar and her supporters. It turns out those pro-Israel dollars are minuscule by comparison to other lobby groups…One could be forgiven for thinking that the organization under discussion was one of the biggest political spenders in America. In reality, AIPAC is a public affairs committee and not a political action committee; as a result, the group itself donates nothing to candidates or campaigns. By far the largest pro-Israel donor to political candidates last election cycle was JStreetAC, which gave entirely to Democrats.

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“Everyone knows the name David Ben-Gurion. Why don’t we know about the spy Jamil Cohen?”

Posted on March 7, 2019 by ArchitectGuy

NEW YORK TIMES
Israel’s Secret Founding Fathers
by Matti Friedman
March 1, 2019

…Understanding that the Jews in Palestine would shortly face a war for survival against the combined might of the Arab world, a few officers in the Jewish military underground were running an ad hoc intelligence unit called the “Arab Section.” Its members were tasked with collecting information in Arab areas: How big was the local militia? What were the imams saying in the mosques? They needed people who could pass. The people who could do this did not want to be called “spies” or “agents,” names which were seen as dishonorable. Another term was needed to describe their service, and one was found in the long history of the Jews of the Arab world. READ MORE

TIMES OF ISRAEL How Israel welcomed Jews from Arab lands — as spies A new book tells the story of Palmach’s Arab Section, and its young Mizrahi Jewish agents who gained society’s respect through their ability to cross borders undetected. “Spies of No Country: Secret Lives at the Birth of Israel,” which tells the captivating tale of Israel’s first spies, young Jewish men originally from Arab countries who could slip across borders undetected. They were part of the “Arab Section” of the Palmach, Israel’s prestate force that would turn into the Israel Defense Forces.

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Palestinians terrorize and torture their journalists and the world stands silent

Posted on March 7, 2019 by ArchitectGuy

GATESTONE
Palestinians: Arresting, Torturing Journalists
by Khaled Abu Toameh
March 7, 2019

The Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank is continuing its unremitting security crackdown on Palestinian journalists, particularly on those who are not affiliated with Mahmoud Abbas’s ruling Fatah faction. Scores of journalists have been arrested or summoned by the PA in the West Bank on a regular basis in the past few years. In the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip, Palestinian journalists are facing a similar campaign of intimidation and harassment…The incarceration of Nasser and Abu Arafeh brings to 16 the number of Palestinian journalists who have been arrested or summoned for interrogation by the PA security forces in the West Bank and Hamas in the Gaza Strip just since the beginning of this year. READ MORE

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The late Yechiel Eckstein helped “change the 2,000-year history where Christians were our biggest enemies, to the point that they are today, I would say, our greatest friends”

Posted on March 7, 2019 by ArchitectGuy

JERUSALEM POST
No Holds Barred: How Christians went from enemies to best friends
by Shmuley Boteach
March 4, 2019

…But with the rise of American Evangelicals, a new movement was born, one that went back to Scripture to establish the eternal Jewish connection to the Land of Israel and the Jewish people as God’s chosen nation. Where Christianity was plagued by “replacement theology,” which says that the Jews were supplanted by Christians as God’s chosen, Evangelicals emphasized the eternal and unchanging character of God’s relationship with the Jews, as promised by Scripture. God is forever. He doesn’t change His mind. As for the Catholic Church, its 180º turn toward the Jews began with the great Pope John XXIII, who followed “Hitler’s Pope” Pius XII. READ MORE

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Rep. Zeldin Votes No on Democrats’ Spineless, Watered-Down anti-Semitism Resolution

Posted on March 7, 2019 by ArchitectGuy

REAL CLEAR POLITICS
Democrats’ Troubling Silence on Omar’s Anti-Semitism
by Charles Lipson
March 7, 2019

…The left’s antipathy to Israel has long been obvious on college campuses. Now, it is being voiced in Congress, and not just by Rep. Omar. She is strongly supported by Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) and now by the House Democratic whip, James Clyburn of South Carolina. Clyburn, the chamber’s highest-ranking African-American, says Omar’s experience is “more personal” than Jews whose parents survived the Holocaust. He will not permit any resolution to single her out. Many of their Democratic colleagues have remained silent, refusing to condemn Omar directly. READ MORE

FEDERALIST David Harsanyi: The Democratic Party Has Normalized Anti-Semitism This week, the Democratic Party was unable to pass a watered-down, platitudinous resolution condemning anti-Semitism, due to “fierce backlash” from presidential candidates, the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC), and the now-powerful progressive base. Rather than censuring Rep. Ilhan Omar, the intellectually frivolous, Hamas-supporting freshman representative from Minnesota, she was rewarded and inoculated from party criticism.

NEW YORK TIMES Bret Stephens: Ilhan Omar Knows Exactly What She Is Doing 
House Democrats are now wrangling over the text of a resolution that was initially intended as a condemnation of anti-Semitism, with Omar as its implicit target. At this writing it is mired in predictable controversy, as members of the party’s progressive wing and black caucus rally to Omar’s side in the first open challenge to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s leadership. In the Senate, the presidential hopefuls Kamala Harris, Bernie Sanders and Warren have weighed in with statements that painted Omar as a victim of Islamophobia — which she is — without mentioning that she’s also a purveyor of anti-Semitic bigotry — which she surely is as well.

THE ATLANTIC Rahm Emanuel, 44th Mayor or Chicago: I’ve Faced the Charge of Dual Loyalty It was anti-Semitic then, and it’s anti-Semitic now.

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“The “Jexodus” movement was started by Jewish millennials who say they are tired of the Democratic party’s “blatant disregard for anti-Semitism”

Posted on March 7, 2019 by ArchitectGuy

THE JEWISH VOICE
‘Jexodus’ group helps Jewish millennials leave Democratic Party
by Joseph Wolkin
March 9, 2019

A new movement called “Jexodus” was launched at the beginning of March, in the midst of Democrats announcing their candidates for the 2020 presidential election. Jewish millennials started the group because they said they are tired of the Democratic party’s “blatant disregard for anti-Semitism.” While many Jexodus members have ideals that align with the Democratic party, they feel anti-Israel agendas that veer into anti-Semitism are taking over. Leading the charge for Jexodus is Elizabeth Pipko, who is serving as the group’s national spokesperson. READ MORE

TIMES OF ISRAEL Rabbi Benjamin Blech: Jews and Political Suicide Jews are supposed to be smart. We never stop boasting, at least to ourselves, about the number of Nobel prize winners from our people, the amazing contributions we have made and continue to make to the world in every field of endeavor. Why is it then that when it comes to politics, to making our voices heard in ways which promote the most important areas of our self-interest and yes, even our survival, we seem to abdicate reason and side with those who make clear that they are our enemies?

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“If a black person tells a white person she said something racist and hurtful, is it appropriate to say, “That’s just a metaphor, and by the way my broader point is correct?”

Posted on March 6, 2019 by ArchitectGuy

THE FEDERALIST
Omar and AOC Don’t Get To Get To Define Anti-Semitism
by David Marcus
March 5, 2019

…In no way, shape, or form is saying that Jews are buying off the government and have dual loyalty mere tropes. They aren’t metaphors, they aren’t figurative, they are literal statements, and, yes, they are very anti-Semitic. But frankly, as bad as the anti-Semitism itself is, arguably worse is that they are telling Jews that it isn’t. They are arrogantly claiming to understand what anti-Semitism is better than Jews do themselves. Who gets to decide what is anti-Semitic? Who gets to decide what is racist, or sexist? Do the targets of the slurs and attacks get any say in this?  It obviously is not, and that’s something that Omar and AOC would undoubtedly agree with. READ MORE

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New US missile defense system in Israel “comes amid increased tensions between Israel and Iran over Israel’s bombing campaign in Syria”

Posted on March 4, 2019 by ArchitectGuy

REUTERS
U.S. deploys THAAD missile defense system to Israel
March 4, 2019

The U.S. military has deployed its most advanced air and missile defense system to Israel for the first time, U.S. and Israeli military officials said on Monday. The deployment, which began in March, was intended to test the U.S. military’s ability to rapidly deploy such weapons around the world, said a spokeswoman for U.S. European Command. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu welcomed the arrival of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system as a sign of the U.S. commitment to Israeli security. READ MORE

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