Senate Bill 88, the public employee union-backed bill to restore defined pensions to all state and local government workers in Alaska, was on the Senate floor for a reconsideration vote on Friday.
Sen. Lyman Hoffman, who co-chairs the Senate Finance Committee, flipped his vote to a no.
The measure still passed, but Hoffman’s vote means that both chairs of Senate Finance oppose the bill, which left their committee with no actuarial fiscal note, and passed the Senate without the fiscal note. It has been sent to the House for consideration.
“That is incredibly significant. We now have two Finance co-chairs opposed to SB 88. A rural Democrat does not believe it is fiscally responsible to reinstate pensions for 37,000 public employees (but several Senate Republicans do,” said one Capitol insider. “It is significant too because it signals to rural Democrats in the House that SB88 is not the best thing since sliced bread.”
Sen. Cathy Giessel, who is the lead sponsor of the bill, was choking up during her “special order” floor speech on Friday, while she talked about public employees. Her husband works for the Department of Transportation and makes between $100,000 and $200,000 a year, according to her financial reports.
She was said to have walked out of a leadership meeting in Senate President’s office crying, perhaps realizing that the prospects for her unvetted bill are weak in the House. Screenshots of her campaign contributions have been circulating on Facebook, showing heavy union support for the Republican who is now caucusing with the Democrats.
“Senator Jesse Bjorkman is up against an army of eco-activists and lobbyists. We Alaskans have the responsibility to hand down the legacy of an affordable and reliable energy system. A Renewable Portfolio Standard is not that.”
The “camel’s nose under the tent” metaphor is: “Don’t allow even small malpractices, because they will grow big eventually.”
Realized or not, the major malpractice in question at this very moment is Alaskans being forced into anti-energy “decarbonization.”
The political war against carbon dioxide (CO2), the building block of life, has wreaked havoc on humanity throughout the world. The implementation of this decarbonization plan is the Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS). This post updates the issues and what can be done to save Alaska’s largest population center from political plunder.
Background
In early 2022, Gov. Mike Dunleavy introduced legislation for an RPS with the press release: “House Bill 301 and Senate Bill 179 will allow Alaska to join 30 states and two territories in creating a renewable portfolio standard in the Railbelt. A key element of the governor’s RPS is a firm commitment to transitioning to 30% sustainable power by 2030 and 80% by 2040.”
Sustainable? That’s a political term. Consumers and taxpayers would beg to differ. So why is a conservative governor no longer disbanding former Gov. Bill Walker’s Green New Deal adherence but going to full-throated adoption and implementation of the anti-energy, anti-industrial globalist agenda?
Much of what is going on today was spawned from policies that were adopted in 2010 when the Alaska State legislature adopted the state’s energy policy and intent. This document outlines a non-binding goal to reach 50% renewable energy by 2025. The sponsor statement written in January 25, 2010, confirms that our legislature had environmental activists writing state policy:
The House Special Committee on Energy Co‐chairs Rep. Bryce Edgmon, D‐Dillingham and former Rep. Charisse Millett, R‐Anchorage used a unique method to draft the bill ‐ they didn’t write it. Instead, they assembled a diverse group of Alaskans with decades of experience in energy policy to come together and write what they believed would make a good energy policy for Alaska.
The Alaska draft climate change policy dated July 27, 2018, is our state-level Green New Deal Implementation Plan. This plan was enabled by the aforementioned 2010 Alaska Energy Policy, which was the creation of Gov. Walker’s 15-person Climate Action for Alaska Leadership Team. This team contains one of the key authors of the 2010 Alaska Energy Policy, who is now lobbying overtime to help push through RPS through at our state capital.
The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 created massive amounts of inflationary matching funds and subsidies. There has been a full-court press led by the feds, environmental non-governmental organizations (ENGOs), government agents, academia, and private equity pirates to take advantage of this money and use it to transform and gain control of the reliability and affordability of our energy. This will guarantee inflation and higher energy costs for Alaskans. The current RPS legislation is the final evolutionary step toward the implementation of the carbon reduction plan that we should be protected from.
RPS in Alaska
RPS is carbon management policy. This idea has been sold to well-meaning people as something that is effective in controlling climate change. Carbon control and management was designed to be “people control” policy. Carbon management has no proven ability to control the climate. This control of energy is nothing but government energy planning, a march down the Road to Serfdom (in the words of free-market economist F. A. Hayek). This policy specifically sets arbitrary mandates requiring that utilities generate a certain percentage of their electricity from renewable sources, not including nuclear.
Many of the advocates for this legislation are against further hydro development, which so strongly makes up their renewable energy percentages. This will greatly escalate the cost to meet the mandates of RPS. Twenty-nine states and the District of Colombia have adopted RPS. Sixteen of these with targets of at least 50% renewable and seventeen states at 100%. Look no further than Germany for an example of how RPS and the premature phase-out of reliable and affordable energy will serve up grade A industrial and economic sabotage, generational debt, and the current aggressive resurgence of carbon based energy power generation.
In one of the most comprehensive studies on RPS completed, at the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago, the authors concluded:
First, these programs’ mandated increase in renewable generation are often smaller than is advertised. Seven years after passage the RPS programs requires a 1.8 percentage point increase in renewable’s share of generation and 12 years after it is 4.2 percentage points.
Second, RPS program passage leads to substantial increases in electricity prices that mirror the program’s increasing stringency over time. Seven years after passage, we estimate that average retail prices are 1.3 cents per kWh or 11% higher than they otherwise would be. The corresponding effect twelve years later is 2.0 cents per kWh or 17% higher.
Third, the estimates indicate that passage of RPS programs lead to reductions in the generating mix’s carbon intensity, although these estimates can be noisier and more sensitive to specification than is ideal.
And if you are a person that believes that we need to “do something” with carbon, and you buy into putting a price on it:
Putting the results together, the cost per metric ton of CO2 abated exceeds $130 in all specifications and ranges up to $460, making it at least several times bigger than conventional estimates of the social cost of carbon.
While Dunleavy’s RPS bill did not pass, a very similar bill, SB 101, was introduced by Alaska State Senator Loki Tobin (D) on March 15, 2023. The senate bill was followed by HB 121 two days later by “conservative” Alaska State Representative Jesse Sumner (R).
The senate bill is currently in the Labor and Commerce committee. The committee Chair, Senator Jesse Bjorkman, vowed that it would not be taken up in his committee, so hopefully it will languish there and wait.
Green Conflict-of-Interest at CEA
In the throes of all this is a menacing constant: the Renewable Energy Alaska Project (REAP), whose CEO Chris Rose has been involved from the very beginning, having authored the state’s initial energy policy. As such, REAP has been working to force their agenda on the rate payers of Chugach Electric Association (CEA) and the State of Alaska in more than one way.
CEA is the sole electric utility provider responsible for providing power to 90,000 members where roughly 40% of Alaskans reside in the Anchorage area.
REAP’s entire existence relies on their business model being mandated for intermittent and expensive renewable energy on us all. RPS is currently being heavily lobbied by REAP at the capital.
Jim Nordlund is a CEA board member who has been in and out of the boardroom for years. He also serves as the chair of REAP’s board and in more than one capacity.
A CEA board meeting was held on Wednesday, Jan. 24. The agenda took up new business to discuss Jim’s perceived conflict of interest, with the discussion taking place well beyond a reasonable hour. This had to be done because REAP was chomping at the bit for the Board to act on their most important resolution of the night, the support of a renewable portfolio standard.
Ultimately CEA corporate counsel was symbolically trotted out to determine that Jim was not a conflict of interest because a resolution has to be passed before a conflict of interest can be realized.
Chugach Electric Board took up public testimony at the beginning of the meeting and a few rate payers voiced opposition to an RPS resolution. The rate payers presented compelling information to the board regarding their concerns. Most of the testimony in support of RPS was emotional and devoid of facts. One man was permitted to testify well over the two-minute timer, which was manned by the Board Chair, Sam Cason.
The board moved to pass (6-1) a resolution to support “A renewable portfolio standard,” and Nordlund did not recuse himself from this vote.
It is no surprise the board voted this way, as most CEA board members are supported by ENGOs. ENGOs place no value on the reliable and affordable energy infrastructure we have today. These ENGOs, under the guidance of Chris Rose and Jim Nordlund, have played their part by instituting the narrative that we are facing an energy crisis and must act now to transition to their fanciful toys – windmills and solar. Good ideas in the free market don’t require mandates. In a resource rich state, we have the capability to power our grid with reliable and affordable sources for generations.
Also interesting is the Chugach Board’s complete disregard for the unreported fact that two of the testifiers referenced. There was a unanimous decision by the Regulatory Commission of Alaska on Dec. 13, 2023, to unanimously oppose RPS legislation.
Pointing to Germany’s demise, RCA Commissioner Robert Pickett stated:
“We’ve heard about the German miracle for, I would say, at this Commission, for six or seven years at least, that it’s a shining example, points in time where the penetration of renewables has been 70 percent, 80 percent, but if you look at what’s happened in the last couple of years, it is clear it is not an economic miracle. In fact, it has devastated German industry and the German government itself is forced to pour in massive amounts of subsidy and Germany has some of the – if not the highest rates per kilowatt in Europe, it’s right at the very top and it’s getting worse, and reliability issues are associated with that.”
RCA Commissioner Pickett went on:
“And so, I guess what has sort of shaped my thinking, when I look at the bill, and there’s some very aggressive, by admission of the bill sponsors for SB 101 and HB 121, that today, they’re estimating about 15 percent of the supply is renewable. And they’re proposing by 2027 to get that up to 25 percent and here we are almost 2024 and so, how does that work? It takes 50 years to get to 15 percent and you’re going to increase that by, you know, 65, 67 percent in the next three years? It doesn’t make any sense and that’s even if the external environment was more stable. I mean, our financial system is sort of on the cusp right now with 35 trillion dollars’ worth of debt and a massive wall of federal debt coming back to the market in the next two years and the interest rates, compared to what they were a year ago, are astronomically higher and all the project sponsors are going to be confronted with that.”
It is with much fecklessness and hubris that the six Chugach Electric Association board members ignored the Regulatory Commission of Alaska’s ruling.
Deep State Forces at Work
According to their website, REAP is supported monetarily by National Renewable Energy Laboratory, a federally funded program with an annual budget of over half a billion dollars. Their mission is heavily geared towards “Energy Justice,” aiming to convince folks that windmills and solar panels equate to equity and diversity. Equitable distribution does not mean everyone gets ample energy – we are just all expected to be equally energy poor.
REAPs non-profit/educational institution/local government constituency includes the Alaska Center and Launch Alaska.
Launch Alaska is a “non-profit accelerator” according to their mission statement: “We’re on a mission to decarbonize the globe, starting in Alaska. We envision equitable, resilient, and prosperous communities rich in economic opportunities, sustainable systems, and clean energy.” Their website discloses “Launch Alaska receives major support from the Office of Naval Research and the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Technology Transitions, as well as McKinley Alaska Private Investment, LLC.”
Alaska Center is an extreme left wing, dark money nonprofit who endorsed three of the two CEA board members (Jim Nordlund and Susanne Fleek-Green) who successfully infiltrated the utility in last years’ election. Along with REAP, Alaska Center also supports a carbon tax.
Nordlund stated in his campaign statement last year:
“While Chugach is a well-managed organization with good employees, they have not been advocating strongly enough for renewable energy since I left the board in 2015…Since that time, the impact of climate change has become more obvious, and Chugach as a member/citizen-owned organization, should do more to reduce our carbon impact by burning less natural gas. Adding fuel to the fire is the fact that less expensive natural gas is running out in Cook Inlet. And now, new federal infrastructure acts are providing over $100 billion to electric cooperatives to improve their systems and adopt clean energy. The time to act on renewables is now, and that is why I want to be on the board.”
As these individuals are so convicted in their principles, I’m sure the offices and homes of everyone employed at these ENGOs are 100% powered by renewables, as well as their work products produced from hamster-powered hemp tablets.
Chugach Board “Progress”
Since the board was handed over to the greens last year, the actions of the board, and those who helped put them there, speak for themselves:
– Requested an average 5.8% rate increase for rate payers.
– Gave themselves a 150% increase in regular board meeting base fees escalating from 2023 to 2026. Rate goes from $300/day in 2023 to $600/day in 2025, to $750/day in 2026.
– Approved a resolution supporting RPS
– While adopting the RPS standards, the board currently sits juxtaposed with a situation where over 80% of the board members are currently siding with the Alaska Center, which favors removal of the Eklutna hydroelectric dam in contradiction with supporting a renewable portfolio standard.
The question one really needs to ask themselves is this: Is carbon dioxide truly the evil molecule that it is portrayed to be? If so, why not target the low hanging fruit such as carbonated beverages, dry ice, yeast and beer? Why you say? Outlawing beer would cause a civil rebellion, the likes of which Bud Light has never seen.
Responding to a false crisis has significant consequences. There has never been a more critical time to care about what is going on at your boring local utility. Beginning mid-April of this year, the members of CEA have the opportunity to right a wrong before it takes us down an unrecoverable path. There are two seats up for reelection this spring of the which the current incumbents are in favor of RPS.
Please let your voice be heard, not only figuratively during the voting period, but literally as well – speak with your friends and neighbors about the perilous path we are currently headed.
Defending Our Energy Infrastructure
As of this writing, Senator Jesse Bjorkman is in the unenviable position of stopping the madness. He is up against an army of eco-activists and lobbyists. If we care about the affordability and reliability of Alaska’s energy, we should wholeheartedly support Senator Bjorkman as he fights off the implementers of RPS. We Alaskans have the responsibility to hand down the legacy of an affordable and reliable energy system. RPS is not that. This is for all Alaskans, for all of time.
Please contact Sen. Jesse Bjorkman to reaffirm him that his rejection of this bill within the Labor and Commerce Committee is the right thing to do for Alaska: (907-465-2828; [email protected]).
Kassie Andrewsis an energy expert on Alaska politics and resource development. A lifelong Alaskan, her career in energy has involved project management, construction, and finance. This opinion first appeared in the Master Resource free-market energy blog and is reprinted with permission.
The Republican Party has used the pro-life vote for decades now, and with the exception of President Donald Trump’s judicial appointments, has given very little reason to expect pro-life voters to continue to support the GOP. This realization is dawning on many lifelong conservatives and Republicans.
Let us look at the local level, here in Alaska.
We still find the same shopworn solutions to abortion in Alaska are being offered and are nothing more than dead ends. This is true even from some of the allegedly pro-life support groups, who dutifully warn how bad things will be if pro-life elected officials are not supported. The mindless logic goes like this:
“The courts have ruled that abortion is a privacy right. We must change the courts! Or, we must have a constitutional amendment. Or we must nibble at the edges, wherein the courts permit certain restrictions. That’s all we can do for now.”
Alaska legalized abortion in 1970, three full years before Roe v. Wade … which also struck down the restrictions Alaska had in place, such as parental permission, gestation limits and so forth.
This law was passed for several reasons, one of which was a libertine view of sexuality that has ever-permeated frontier areas, but also because as a new state, misguided legislators wanted Alaska to be seen as “progressive.”
The law was vetoed by Gov. Keith Miller, which was quickly and easily overridden. But let us review the constitutional options that have never been exercised and are still in place.
For starters, the first breath of the state constitution reads as follows: “This constitution is dedicated to the principles that all persons have a natural right to life …”
So, what on earth do we need a constitutional amendment for? Who says that unborn persons are not persons? It was certainly accepted in 1955, when the constitutional convention met, and also in 1958 when the people approved statehood and the state constitution.
And it still is today when a woman is assaulted or murdered while carrying an unborn child. But the evil courts and their case law have decided, on their own warped authority, that the unborn child is protected only if it is “wanted,” or some such illogical nonsense.
It seems impossible, but let us suppose that we had a conservative state supreme court. It could have immediately declared the 1970 abortion legalization law as unconstitutional, citing Article I, Section 1, quoted above.
OK, so we didn’t have a conservative state court, either then or now. But we did have a pro-life governor, who vetoed the law. But then, it was constitutionally overridden.
Let’s play a hypothetical game: suppose the legislature and/or courts declared that Alaska Natives, Jews or other minorities were not fully human, or “persons” before the law. Then, vetoed by a governor, then the veto overridden.
Let’s check out Article III, Sec. 16: “[The governor] may, by appropriate court action or proceeding brought in the name of the state, enforce compliance with any constitutional or legislative mandate, or restrain violation of any constitutional or legislative power, duty, or right by any officer, department or agency of the state or any of its political subdivisions. This authority shall not be construed to authorize any action or proceeding against the legislature.”
You will notice that it does not say “the judiciary.”
The fiction that we have “three co-equal branches of government” is once again shattered with that omission. The Legislature has ever been considered superior over the executive and judicial branches, on both the state and federal levels. But they can make mistakes, too, just like the other branches. And enforcement is not within their purview, it is with the executive.
So, Gov. Miller might have invoked this section, refusing to allow such a hypothetically hideous law in Alaska. Yes, we would have had a constitutional crisis. Yes, they might have impeached him for it. You do not need any legal grounds for impeachment anyway, it can be trumped up on any pretense. But Miller would have had the constitution on his side, for everyone admits that this section gives Alaska’s governors a power not found in most other states.
Now Alaska Natives, Jews and other minorities enjoy sympathy and privilege in this state, so the given example would not happen, at least in the current culture. But we do have a culture that does not see the unwanted/unborn as enjoying such protections.
It is, of course, utterly arbitrary, as we have seen in regards to the death of an unborn child that is “wanted.” It is also selfish, brutal, stone-hearted, unconstitutional, and — this really infuriates the Left — utterly unscientific.
Miller lacked the full knowledge of the constitutional powers he possessed, or determined that it would be a fight not worth engaging. With the abdication of the battlefield, the Left has been emboldened to even more preposterous unconstitutional actions in the decades that have followed.
We can start with the right to privacy, enacted in 1972 for the sake of our personal electronic data being protected at the dawn of the computer age. The amendment was wisely written in anticipation of what we are now seeing, and if you haven’t noticed, it is utterly ineffective for the purpose in which it was approved.
But things get even worse: The understanding that the judiciary was often an enemy of constitutions was fully anticipated, so the amendment further reads, “The legislature shall implement this section.”
Yet, the judiciary has gotten away with impeachable offenses by deciding that they will define, and hence “implement,” what privacy means. And, naturally, abortion quickly became its pet to protect at all costs. From there, it was an easy bridge to cross when “privacy” meant, by their case law reasoning, to extend to public funding of abortion.
They apparently were not concerned at all with the privacy of individual citizens’ consciences, or their purse.
All the while, allegedly pro-life governors such as Hickel, Palin, Parnell and Dunleavy, and allegedly pro-life legislative majorities in the past, have dutifully tried to end this constitutional overthrow by following supposedly “constitutional” boundaries the judiciary invented — only to find that, after time-consuming hearings and testimony … Ta Da! … the goalposts were moved further back, negating all efforts.
We see that the arrogance of the judiciary now extends into new areas that have nothing to do with abortion, such as usurping the powers of grand juries. But the timorous, allegedly conservative legislators have done little or nothing to stop this.
Except, of course, Rep. David Eastman, who is universally detested for not being a “team player.” But Eastman never votes or acts without first asking, “Is this constitutional?” His fellow colleagues, who take the same oath, rely upon the judiciary to let them know what “constitutional” means, as if they are too ignorant or uneducated to think for themselves.
Many likely secretly agree with him, but they don’t dare cross over to his side, for fear of being “Eastmanized” by their colleagues, the media and the bureaucracy. Thus, their oath to support both the state and federal constitutions is turned over to the very people — the judiciary and the bureaucrats — that they use as a way to gain the votes and trust of their conservative constituents, to effect a change that both they and their Leftist enemies, know will never occur.
It’s a squirrel cage.
Bob Bird is chair of the Alaskan Independence Party and the host of a talk show on KSRM radio, Kenai.
Ann Brown, who has been the chairwoman of the Alaska Republican Party for since 2021, is stepping down. The party chair position comes up at the next State Convention for the Alaska Republican Party, which will be in Anchorage April 19-21.
Brown sent her top committee officers a letter today, in which she explained she and her husband wanted to do other things besides party business in the coming years.
“I have tried to serve faithfully, always giving my best to the Party I love. Now the time has come for Fred and me to do the things we enjoy together.
“Thank you for the opportunity to serve as your Chairman. There is plenty of time for those who wish to run for state party office to throw their hats in the ring, so to speak. For now, let’s put our noses to the grindstone and work for successful events such as the PPP, district conventions and state convention,” Brown wrote.
Brown took over as chair after former Party Chairman Glenn Clary resigned after being offered a job at Liberty University in May of 2021.
At this point, only Nikki Rose has announced that she is running for party chairwoman, although others are considering throwing their name in the hat.
The Alaska Republican Party has 142,955 registered voters, while the Alaska Democratic Party has 74,961 registered voters in Alaska. The Alaska GOP is the largest organized political group in the state.
During the April GOP convention, the delegates will also choose people to be delegates to the National Republican Nominating Convention, which will be in Milwaukee, Wisc. July 15-18, 2024. That is when the party will formally nominate its candidate for president.
Joelle Hall, president of the AFL-CIO in Alaska, explained today on the Must Read Alaska Show that Joey Merrick, Business Manager for Laborers’ Local 341 has started a company to invest in the Alaska LNG project.
The company, Alaska Gasline & LNG, is working with two firms — a labor insurance and investment company and an asset management business — to take control of the long-awaited LNG project.
Join host John Quick to hear the discussion with Hall. In this episode, Hall opens up about her journey to Alaska, her experiences in the U.S. Army, and her ascent to leading the state’s largest union federation.
She addresses conservative criticisms of public sector unions, offering her viewpoints to bring context to the debate.
Hall also highlights the importance of the LNG project for Alaska, detailing its potential benefits for the workforce and the economy, providing a well-rounded exploration of pressing labor issues in the state.
Seattle, told by a lower court judge that it could not enforce its anti-graffiti laws, has won in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which said the city’s ordinance was not unconstitutional, as claimed by four people arrested for defacing public property in 2021.
City Attorney Ann Davison appealed the lower court ruling in July and the oral arguments were hard by the Ninth Circuit on Jan. 3, 2024.
“The people of Seattle won an important victory today when the Ninth Circuit upheld our City’s right to enforce our laws against graffiti property destruction,” said City Attorney Ann Davison, who ran for office on a law-and-order platform in a city that has devolved into what some see as a liberal hellhole. “Graffiti is a massive problem for our City, costing taxpayers, businesses, and residents millions of dollars while creating widespread visual blight. We must have as many tools as possible to protect neighbors and residents impacted by graffiti.”
Last June, the U.S. District Court judge in Seattle had enjoined the city from enforcing its graffiti ordinance, known as Seattle Municipal Code 12A.08.020(A)(2).
It’s a victory for Seattle City Attorney Ann Davison, who made public disorder and specifically graffiti crackdowns central to her campaign two years ago.
The four plaintiffs had been arrested for using chalk on the sidewalk in front of the Seattle East Precinct police building to write statements such as “F[***] the Police.” Although they were not prosecuted, they did spend a night in jail, and now, in 2024, the two-year statute of limitations has run out on a potential indictment. But the four graffiti writers sued anyway, saying their First Amendment rights had been violated and that the Seattle ordinance is overly vague under the 14th Amendment.
A liberal Seattle judge who had been appointed by former President Bill Clinton agreed with the four and said that such an arrest amounted to censorship. She noted that children would be unlikely to be arrested for drawing rainbows on the sidewalk in front of their houses, but the four people were arrested for writing something that “irks” an officer of the law. But City Attorney Davison said that District Judge Marsha Pechman’s argument was wildly hypothetical.
“The mere fact that the city and its officers have discretion to enforce the local ordinance in some circumstances and not others is not a sufficient basis for concluding that the local ordinance is wholly vague such that it can never be enforced,” the three-judge panel at the 9th Circuit explained in their brief, agreeing with Davison.
The attorney for the four said that the case is not over.
Braden Pence, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said in a statement that their lawsuit will continue in the courts.
“Our fight for the right to criticize the Seattle Police Department in children’s sidewalk chalk written on public property without fear of arrest and booking into jail is not over,” Pence said in a statement. “The Ninth Circuit left open paths whereby Judge Pechman can still find the anti-writing ordinance unconstitutional, and we look forward to continuing to pursuing these claims in court.”
Immediately following the Oct. 7 slaughter of Israeli innocents by Hamas terrorists, the prominent initial reaction was condemnation of the attacks and support for Israel, even by liberals such as Chuck Schumer and Joe Biden.
The near-universal support for the Jewish state quickly turned as leftists began perversely blaming Israel for the beheadings, rapes, and murders committed toward their own people.
The leftist mobs, whose obsession with demonstrations against all things western brought us Occupy Wall Street, the Women’s March, Antifa/BLM riots, and endless screeches about transgender women being women, gladly focused their trendy hate toward Jews. Their anti-Semitism is thinly veiled, but not fully disguised, as anti-Zionism.
The same ilk that insisted during the “Me Too” hysteria that all women who claim to be victims of sexual harassment and assault must be believed without question, seem to be the same people that are now questioning Jewish women’s claims of rape and torture at the hands of Hamas hordes.
The defenders of women’s allegations have become skeptics who want to see photographic proof of the violations; yet when shown videos of the atrocities as filmed by the Hamas attackers themselves, they deny the veracity of the videos. The images, they claim, are either propaganda or don’t actually show the hideous violations needed to substantiate the Jewish claims.
The mobs do their best to mimic post-war Nazi sympathizers and other anti-Semitic allies that to this day deny the deaths of six million Jews during the Final Solution, and they are finding sympathetic ears among 1) the mainstream media and 2) what is now being revealed as the base of the Democrat party. Schumer and Biden, as liberal as they are, are dinosaurs in a party now steered by the far left, although the latter is softening his stance to appease the radical demographic.
The anti-Israel demonstrations, often taking place or at least emanating from America’s college campuses, are exposing the inherent hate of its participants. College professors and administrators – vividly exposed as hypocritical and anti-Semitic during their own pitiful testimonies in front of Congress – provide guidance for their gullible and rudderless student minions, but traditional liberals are afraid of calling them out because the leftists now occupy the Democrat base, and it is too politically dangerous to alienate such a loyal bloc of voters, especially when the most important thing in their universe is keeping Donald Trump from ever again stepping foot in the White House.
One of the most outspoken critics making the connection between pro-Palestinian Hamas supporters and leftist mobs is Dennis Prager — prolific author, syndicated radio host with 400 affiliate stations, and founder of Prager U. He is a proud adherent to Judaism and an unabashed Israeli apologist who has long been frustrated by the tendency of his American Jewish brethren to vote for Democrats and leftists while simultaneously forsaking the Republicans and conservatives who have been far more supportive of Israel.
While hate groups such as neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan have traditionally received the label of “right wing” even though their groups are either fascist-based or founded by the Democrat party, the labels stuck, and anti-Semitism was associated with right wing movements.
Prager explored this phenomenon during an October 2022 interview of Benjamin Netanyahu, when he asked the conservative Israeli Prime Minister if he ever imagined a world in which the Left, rather than the Right, would be Israel’s biggest enemy. Netanyahu answered that his conservative upbringing, support for the United States, and commitment to free economies, led him to believe the right side of the political spectrum was where Israel’s support would lie.
During a recent debate at Oxford College regarding the Hamas-Israel war, Prager addressed the argument that Israel’s aggressive military response has been disproportionate because thousands more innocent Gaza lives have been lost since Oct. 7 than Israeli lives lost in the initial massacre itself. Prager offered a World War II analogy. Seeing as how he was in England for the debate, Prager referenced Great Britain’s response toward Nazi aggression. Britain caused far more German casualties than they suffered themselves. Was that disproportionate? Was it improper for Britain to bring the Aryan fascists to complete devastation, or would the proper thing have been to match the number of German casualties with the number of Brit casualties?
The latter argument appears to be what the pro-Hamas/anti-Semitic demonstrators are calling for. Hamas murdered some 1,300 Israelis on October 7th, so that should evidently be their numerical limit for the number of Palestinians/Hama supporters who meet their demise. Using this logic, one has to wonder, then, if Israel should then have a right to kidnap a couple hundred Gazans and behead a few dozen babies as well. You know, just to make things even.
Israel has to response in an intensely aggressive and utterly devastating manner in response to the October massacre. Prime Minister Netanyahu’s pledge to destroy Hamas is valid and must be carried out to completion. The continued existence of the Jewish state depends on it.
The Left, however, continues to surprise at such an appalling level that one must wonder whether it’s intentionally antagonistic. For example, the debate question at Prager’s Oxford appearance was, “Is Hamas a greater obstacle to peace than Israel?” The question itself begs incredulity. Such a question, Prager pointed out, could only come these days from an academic institution.
To equate the two groups as moral equals is ignorant naivete at best and blatant evil at worst (author’s words, not Prager’s).
Just as Nazi Germany was a greater threat to peace than Great Britain in the 1930s, so too is Hamas a greater threat to peace than Israel today. Prager advances his argument by conjoining Hamas with Isis, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Hezbollah. When questioned why he used Muslim and/or Arab movements as examples (because, of course, in the eyes of the Left, criticizing Muslims and Arabs is Islamophobic and racist; whereas arguing against Jews and Israel is legitimate critique), Prager pointed out that these are the only groups on earth that behead people.
In no other conflicts is there a debate about when it comes to a police state (Hamas) fighting a democratic state (Israel). The only country for which it is acceptable to target for extinction is Israel. Prager’s defense of Israel is necessary. It provides a flicker of common sense in a dark world.
When Prager visited Anchorage in 2022, he expressed a desire to return so he could experience the Northern Lights, so he is returning, this time to Fairbanks for two presentations on Saturday, Feb. 24. We are fortunate to have a courageous intellectual like Dennis Prager visiting us.
Tim Barto is a regular contributor to Must Read Alaska, a longtime follower of Dennis Prager, and vice president of Alaska Family Council – the organization bringing Prager to Alaska.
U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan responded today to retaliatory strikes launched by U.S. forces against Iranian terrorist proxies in Syria and Iraq.
Iran-backed terrorist proxies have launched over 160 attacks on U.S. forces in the Middle East since last October, including killing three U.S. service members and wounding dozens more in a drone attack on Jan. 28.
“The Biden administration’s response to these attacks—delayed for almost a week, and now signaling where our military will and will not strike—has been disastrous to the point of being dangerous,” said Sen. Sullivan, who is a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Sullivan reiterated his statements during an invited appearance on CNN.
“What would be more effective is to send the message to Iran’s leadership that if the Houthis continue to use Iranian missiles and Iranian intelligence from Iranian spy ships to target U.S. Navy vessels in the Red Sea, we will sink those Iranian spy ships. That is how you begin to reestablish deterrence. The Biden administration needs a sustained, multi-faceted strategy that also focuses on non-military actions—in particular, reimposing the comprehensive sanctions against the Iranian oil and gas sector that proved to be so effective during the Trump administration,” Sullivan said.
On Friday, the U.S. military struck Iran’s Quds Force units and Iran-associated militias in Iraq and Syria, a week after Houthi terrorists attacked U.S. military personnel in Jordan, killing three and injuring up to 40 American service members.
U.S. Central Command reported the strikes hit dozens of targets, and took out the command and control headquarters, ammunition storage, intelligence centers, and other locations used by a branch of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, known as the Quds Force.
In addition, smaller militias associated with the Iranian military, similar to the Houthis, were hit, with the U.S. military striking at least 85 targets in seven locations, with more than 125 major munitions, some coming from long-range bombers.
They may have used an aircraft stationed in an island in the Indian Ocean or the United States, and would have used B-52s, B-1s, or B-2s, or any combination of the three. It’s also possible they used fighters with stand-off weapons from an aircraft carrier or nearby bases, from allied or U.S. locations.
Sullivan’s office provided a timeline of his recent actions and reactions to Biden’s Middle East policies:
On November 2, 2023, Sen. Sullivan led 12 of his Senate Republican colleagues in a letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken, demanding the Biden administration press for a broader, more permanent framework of sanctions on Iran from the United Nations Security Council (UNSC).
On November 14, 2023, Sens. Sullivan and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), and a number of their Senate colleagues, introduced a resolution emphasizing the fact that deterrence is most credible when the President keeps all options on the table, including the use of military force, to deter attacks from Iran and its proxies.
On December 12, 2023, Sen. Sullivan and a number of his colleagues again sent a letter to Secretary Blinken, urging him to re-designate the Houthis as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO), as well as Specially Designated Global Terrorists (SDGT).
On January 12, 2024, Sen. Sullivan expressed his support for the strikes on the Houthi rebels in Yemen, which he said were “long overdue.”
On January 12, 2024, in an interview with NBC’s Kristen Welker, Sen. Sullivan reiterated his call on the Biden administration to reestablish deterrence with regard to Iran, and argued that tougher action against Iran and its proxies will help avoid a wider war, not appeasement.
On January 17, 2024, Sen. Sullivan said the decision to redesignate the Houthi rebels as an SDGT is a “step forward” that “doesn’t go far enough.”
On January 28, 2024, Sen. Sullivan called for a “clear, lethal and overwhelming response” to the strike carried out by Iran-backed terrorist proxies that killed 3 U.S. service members and wounded dozens of others.
On January 29, 2024, in an interview on Fox News Channel, Sen. Sullivan criticized the Biden administration for pursuing an appeasement strategy toward Iran, and called for a return to the aggressive deterrence policies enacted during the Trump administration.
Planned for months and involving several other states, the Alaska National Guard may be once again going to the southern border to assist with border protection.
The action is not in direct response to the current border standoff between Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and President Joe Biden, who has demanded that Abbott remove razor wire from land along the border of Mexico.
It is also not a major deployment, as has been characterized by some in social media, but consists of just 20 Guardsmen and two helicopters. The Department of Defense has asked Alaska and other states to train guardsmen for possible help with the border.
It happens on a semi-regular basis. In 2019, about 10 members of the Alaska National Guard were deployed to the American side of the U.S.-Mexico border to help with border security.
“The Alaska Army National Guard has been notified by the National Guard Bureau that it is authorized to begin training in preparation for possible mobilization to support the federal Southwest Border Mission in early FY 2025,” according to a statement by the Alaska National Guard.
“The memorandum directs the AKARNG General Support Aviation Battalion to be prepared to deploy two LUH-72 Lakota helicopters and 20 Guardsmen consisting of aircrew, maintenance specialists, and other support personnel,” the Guard said.
“Upon the final decision by the Secretary of Defense and Headquarters, Department of the Army, the unit will receive official alert and mobilization. If mobilized, the aviation detachment would deploy in a Title 10 (federally funded) status and provide rotary wing aviation support to Joint Task Force- North in support of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection along the Southwest border.
Created in 1989, Joint Task Force North (JTF-N) was established as Joint Task Force – Six (JTF-6). In response to President George H.W. Bush’s renewed counterdrug efforts, Army Gen. Colin Powell, then commanding general of U.S. Army’s Forces Command, issued an order Nov. 13, 1989 establishing JTF-6 at Fort Bliss, Texas.
The order established JTF-6 to serve as the planning and coordinating operational headquarters to support local, state and federal law enforcement agencies within the southwest border region to counter the flow of illegal drugs into the United States, the military says on the JTF-N website.
JTF-6’s original area of operations consisted of the four border states of California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas – a land area of more than 660,000 square miles. In February 1995, by directive of the commanding general of U.S. Army Forces Command, JTF-6’s area of responsibility was expanded to include the entire continental United States, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.
JTF-6’s efforts led to both a greater recognition of the potential for military assistance in counterdrug efforts and a significant expansion of the partnership among active-duty forces, Reserve and National Guard components, and the nation’s law enforcement agencies.
In 2004, the commander of U.S. Northern Command (USNORTHCOM) ordered JTF-6’s re-designation as JTF-N. The command’s mission has expanded to include providing homeland security and counter transnational organized crime support to the nation’s federal law enforcement agencies, and its area of responsibility has expanded to include USNORTHCOM’s area of responsibility.
From its inception as JTF-6 to its evolution as JTF-N, the command has supported more than 6,000 missions in direct support of the nation’s local, state and federal law enforcement agencies and counterdrug task forces.
