Source: Fox News
“Mayor Eric Adams and New York City Police Department top brass condemned ‘outside agitators’ fanning the flames of anti-Israel protests at Columbia and New York University, as police made more arrests. At his usual Tuesday press conference from City Hall, Adams, a Democrat and former police officer, praised the NYPD’s response. ‘We can’t have outside agitators come in and be destructive to our city,’ Adams said. ‘Someone wanted something to happen at that protest at NYU.’ ‘People who peacefully protest for an issue, they’re not throwing bottles and chairs,’ the mayor added. ‘And so we know that we have acknowledged and saw across the country, there are people who come have nothing to do with the issue and they want to aggravate. Now, if those police officers didn’t show a high level of discipline, this could have been an ugly situation.'” (04/23/24)
https://www.foxnews.com/us/adams-nypd-blame-outside-agitators-fueling-anti-israel-protests-columbia-nyu
Source: Common Sense
by Paul Jacob
“If you attend Oklahoma State University, you are, I hope, now free to speak. OSU will shut down a ‘bias response team’ instituted to harass speech on campus. We can thank a group called Speech First, which sued the school. … The settlement also requires the school to pay Speech First $18,000 for legal expenses. OSU had tried to get the lawsuit dismissed because Speech First protected the names of its plaintiffs, OSU students. Speech First’s reason for using pseudonyms is pretty commonsensical: to protect plaintiffs from retaliation. That a university with a policy of punishing students for renegade speech might also punish them for participating in a lawsuit to end this policy doesn’t seem like a farfetched concern.” (04/23/24)
https://thisiscommonsense.org/2024/04/23/college-censors-squelched/
Source: Common Dreams
by Edward Ahmed Mitchell & Robert McCaw
“The spirit of Joseph McCarthy is alive and well in the halls of Congress. For proof, look no further than the Republican-controlled House education committee’s latest hearing focused on investigating allegations of antisemitism at American colleges and universities. During last week’s widely covered hearing, many committee members followed a predictable playbook: mischaracterize any pro-Palestinian student activism as antisemitic, ask incendiary ‘gotcha’ questions about imaginary incidents of antisemitism, and then pressure college leaders to silence young people who advocate for Palestinian human rights. House committee members like Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) have mastered this artform, which gives them an opportunity to go viral in right-wing media, smear pro-Palestinian students, and virtue signal that they oppose any form of bigotry even as their political party enables nearly every form of bigotry.” (04/23/24)
https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/house-gop-campus-antisemitism
Source: United Press International
“The city of Baltimore is blaming the the owner and manager of a merchant vessel that crashed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge late last month of negligence. In a filing in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, Northern Division, the city of Baltimore and its council said Grace Ocean Private and Synergy Marine ‘were grossly and potentially criminally negligent’ in their operations of the Dali container ship. The 985-foot Dali container ship is owned by Grace Ocean Private and it is managed by Synergy Marine. Early March 26, the vessel lost power shortly after leaving the Port of Baltimore and crashed into the bridge, causing it to immediately collapse.” (04/23/24)
https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2024/04/23/Baltimore-accuses-ship-firms-negligence/6261713860485/
Source: Antiwar.com
“US Preparing Major Arms Package for Ukraine, Attack on US Bases in Iraq and Syria, and More.” (04/23/24)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lirF-OE1jzA
Source: The American Conservative
by Michael Warren Davis
“Everyone knows that the Moscow Patriarchate is in bed with the Kremlin. Few realize that the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople is deeply beholden to the United States government. This ignorance is surprising, given that many Greek Orthodox leaders are quite proud of the fact.” (04/23/24)
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-cias-man-in-constantinople/
Source: SFGate
“What began last week when students at a New York Ivy League school refused to end their protest against Israel’s war with Hamas had turned into a much larger movement by Tuesday as students across the nation set up encampments, occupied buildings and ignored demands to leave. Protests against the war had been bubbling for months but kicked into a higher gear after more than 100 pro-Palestinian demonstrators who had camped out on Columbia University’s upper Manhattan campus were arrested Thursday. Dozens more protesters have been arrested at other campuses since, and many now face charges of trespassing or disorderly conduct. With tensions at Columbia continuing to run high and some students afraid to set foot on the campus, officials said the university will switch to hybrid learning for the rest of the semester.” (04/23/24)
https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/columbia-switches-to-hybrid-learning-amid-19417611.php
Source: The Volokh Conspiracy
by Ilya Somin
“The Eighth Amendment provides little, if any, protection for the homeless. But courts can help them by striking down exclusionary zoning, which is the major cause of housing shortages that lead to homelessness.” (04/22/24)
https://reason.com/volokh/2024/04/22/fight-homelessness-by-ending-exclusionary-zoning/
Source: ABC News
“A man who works for a German far-right lawmaker in the European Parliament has been arrested on suspicion of spying for China, authorities said Tuesday. The detention came less than 24 hours after three people were arrested for spying for China in a separate German case. The suspect was arrested Monday in the eastern German city of Dresden, federal prosecutors said in a statement. They said that he has worked for a German lawmaker in the European Union’s legislature since 2019. The German national is accused of working for a Chinese intelligence service and of repeatedly passing on information on negotiations and decisions in the European Parliament in January. Prosecutors allege that he also snooped on Chinese dissidents in Germany.” (04/23/24)
https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/german-eu-lawmakers-aide-arrested-suspicion-spying-china-109523643
Source: Show-Me Institute
“SB 727 Reaction with Susan Pendergrass and James Shuls.” (04/22/24)
https://showmeinstitute.org/blog/education/sb-727-reaction-with-susan-pendergrass-and-james-shuls/
