Points to Ponder

By Rich Kozlovich

Africa

Doctors Without Borders: Hundreds of Millions in Ebola Funds Have Disappeared in Congo — ‘Speechless’ - A report from the international humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders (MSF) on Thursday revealed that, despite “hundreds of millions of dollars” from global aid groups being sent to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to fight the ongoing Ebola outbreak there, the situation on the ground remains destitute.

What Happened to All the Aid Money? Somalia Is Reportedly on the Brink of Famine. -The widespread fraud in Minnesota's Somali community is not breaking news. At least $9 billion was stolen from taxpayers via the state's welfare programs including Medicaid, housing, and even the autism programs. Millions were lost to the  "Feeding Our Future" scandal, too. We learned last year that almost $400 million was funneled to Al-Shabaab, the Somali-based Islamic terrorist group, and CBS News reported that millions were spent on luxury cars, lakefront homes, and sent to banks in China and Kenya.......

Black Crime 

Black Male Beats and Kicks White High School Girl on Bus as Driver Refuses to Immediately Pull Over and Intervene – School Didn’t Notify Victim’s Parents - Shocking video posted to social media shows a black male beating and kicking a white high school girl on a bus in Youngstown, Ohio, as the driver refused to pull over and intervene. The Boardman Local School District launched an investigation after a black male brutally beat and appeared to choke a white teen girl on a bus transporting students to Mahoning Valley Community School last Friday. The victim, a 10th grade girl, was taken to a hospital with severe injuries.........(My Take - And where's the outrage over this? Where are the screams about racism? Why isn't anyone demonstrating and marching in the streets?  No buildings are being burned and no one is attacking the police.  Remarkable! Is it possible none of that is spontaneous and only occurs when it's organized?  Just a thought!  RK)  

Economics 

Adam Smith’s Hidden Parable -  The poor man’s son, over several decades, indeed, arrives at wealth.   It’s disappointing. For one thing, “he begins at last to find that wealth and greatness are mere trinkets of frivolous utility.” Throughout TMS, Smith teaches that “what constitutes the real happiness of human life” is not so much one’s material condition as one’s moral condition. For another thing, one’s estate will go sideways if not diligently led and maintained. The gardens of magnificence, the teams of servants, the operations of enterprise are “enormous and operose machines” that “must be kept in order with the most anxious attention, and which in spite of all our care are ready every moment to burst into pieces, and to crush in their ruins their unfortunate possessor.”.......

Staying Off the Road to Serfdom - Gregg admits, in using a term like “civilization” because “the notion that some cultures are more accomplished or advanced does not sit well with our egalitarian instincts.” Thus, he is careful to qualify his terms. As he points out, high culture does not prevent a society from slipping into barbarism, and there have been civilizations that were not especially commercial. For Gregg, “civilization functions as a way of describing an identifiable conglomeration of practices, knowledge, manners, traditions, organizations, and institutions.” Often geographical but not necessarily so, civilization involves the transmission of wisdom across the centuries in the form of the written word and art. Beliefs and traditions are another window into a civilization’s foundational ideas.

And yet we cannot escape making comparisons. After all, some societies are governed well, with a strong rule of law. Others endure arbitrary rule by the powerful. As Gregg points out, “Civilizational growth involves improvements in the social environment that are mirrored in the moral development of individuals.” In the end, Gregg argues we can measure real progress by “opportunities for material, social, and even moral improvement for increasing numbers of people” who escape history’s norm of poverty, ignorance, and oppression. Citing Austrian economist Carl Menger, Gregg identifies the sophisticated division of labor as the hallmark of an advanced civilization, for it allows the increasing accumulation of knowledge and wisdom......(My Take - The reality is these comparisons are essential to overcome the bombast by leftists promoting globalism and multiculturalism..  Much of the world is not civilized, and that's just the fact of the matter. RK)  

Biggest gas price drop in 18 years - Yesterday saw the biggest one-day drop in the price of gasoline in eighteen (18) years. That would have been during the financial collapse of 2008. According to AAA, the national average price for regular stands at 3.94 per gallon, down almost four cents from yesterday. From my local station this morning: The average national price is down more than 18 cents from a week ago and 42 cents from a month ago.  

Maine Required Childless Adults to Work to Get Food Stamps. Here’s What Happened. - One trillion dollars—that’s how much the government spent last year on means-tested welfare aid, providing cash, food, housing, medical care, and social services to poor and low-income individuals. The food stamp program is the nation’s second largest welfare program. The number of food stamp recipients has risen dramatically, from 17.2 million in 2000 to 45.8 million in 2015.  The number of food stamp recipients has risen dramatically, from 17.2 million in 2000 to 45.8 million in 2015. Costs have soared over the same period, from $20.7 billion in 2000 to $83.1 billion in 2014.......In the first three months after Maine’s work policy went into effect, its caseload of able-bodied adults without dependents plummeted by 80 percent, falling from 13,332 recipients in Dec. 2014 to 2,678 in March 2015.........

Immigration 

Illegal Alien Semi-Truck Driver Released Into US By Joe Biden Plows Into Minivan, Kills Mother and Her Two Young Sons in Missouri - An illegal alien semi-truck driver released into the US by Joe Biden in 2023 plowed into a minivan and killed a mother and her two young sons in Kansas City, Missouri, on Monday. According to reports, 39-year-old Eldar Skandar was driving a semi-truck on Highway 71 near downtown Kansas City when he plowed into a Honda Odyssey carrying a family of five and several other cars. Olga Sorbalo, 35, and her two sons, Luis, 8, and Samir, 4, died.......

Trump Warns Mexico as Migrant Caravan Moves Toward US Border Following Democrat Midterm Gains: “There will be no leniency!” - Following the midterm election, The Gateway Pundit reported that a massive migrant caravan busted through the Mexican border en route to the United States. At least 800 migrants busted through Mexico, optimistic after the Democrats took control of the House and the Senate. The latest migrant caravan is mainly comprised of Hondurans. Video posted to social media shows the migrants walking over the Rodolfo Robles International Bridge from Guatemala into Ciudad Hidalgo Chiapas on Friday night.......

Midterm Election/Voter Fraud

What happened in the midterms - As they turned out, the midterms were a near extinction level event for the Republican Party. I urge interested readers to check out Jeff Anderson’s review of relevant exit polls in the American Mind column “What happened in the midterms.” Do take in his support for this conclusion: If this election can be summed up in a single exit-poll question, it might be this one: “Do you think Congress is »

BIG UPDATE….. Can Algorithms Pave the Way to Stealing Elections? – Important 2024 Study by Jerome Corsi Is a Must-Read – Lines Up with 2026 Algorithm! - In this article published in American Thinker, I explained how a political scientist could run a simulation of an election to achieve a desired outcome. The political scientist could then throw away the actual votes in the election, run the simulation as the actual results, and the public would not know the difference. The only way the election fraud could be determined with certainty is if some genius figured out the algorithm the political scientist created to run the simulation........

Saudi Arabia 

Saudi Arabia Turns to Syria for Troops as Iran-Backed Houthis Fire Missiles and Drones at Riyadh  - The Iran-backed Houthis said they fired missiles and drones at Riyadh on November 8 as Saudi Arabia sought troops from Syria’s new government. Saudi Arabia’s Energy Ministry said falling shrapnel from an “attempted attack” caused minor damage to a Saudi Aramco administrative building in the King Abdullah Financial District. No casualties were reported. (My Take - Saudi Arabia is a stunningly wealth nation with a stunning lazy inept population and a weak military.  Not a good combination, so they're buying their security.  RK)

UK 

Egypt Places Muslim Association of Britain on Its Terrorist List - An Egyptian court has placed the Muslim Association of Britain on Egypt’s list of terrorist entities for five years, the Egyptian Gazette reported, citing the Middle East News Agency (MENA), Egypt’s official, state-run news agency. The Cairo Criminal Court on Tuesday “ordered the inclusion of 35 entities and 36 individuals on Egypt’s lists of terrorist entities and terrorists for five years,” the Gazette reported.......