Violence Mars Memorial

A peace vigil was held yesterday by community activists in Minneapolis at George Floyd Square, the site of Floyd's murder. Everyone suddenly had to run for cover as gunshots rang out. Witnesses said as many as 30 shots were fired. 

The event and what interrupted it are poignant reminders of what is bedeviling urban communities all over America.

None of the shots were fired by police officers. It's no exaggeration to say that hundreds of shots are fired every night in America's cities. According to the Washington Post, more than 300 people are shot every day in the United States. (Twenty percent are suicides.) It's rare that police fire those shots. 

Thousands of minorities are killed in urban cities every year. According to the FBI, nearly 7,500 black Americans were killed in 2019. Nearly 90% of the victims were black men. 

Now, here's what you must understand:

·     According to the Washington Post database of police shootings, 3.7% of those black men (245 people total) were killed by police. 

·     And of that 3.7%, 88% were armed with a weapon.

For the past year, we have obsessed over the interaction between the Minneapolis police and George Floyd. There has been great wailing and gnashing of teeth. There have been riots. And there have been reforms of varying degrees across the country.

But, as we noted yesterday, the murder rate in America is soaring. More Americans are dying in our cities now than one year ago. That's clearly not progress.

Instead of focusing on the overwhelming majority of murders caused by gangs and drugs, we have implemented public policies that make it more likely more minorities will be killed. That's not progress.

We're handcuffing the police, defunding the police, opening our borders and legalizing drugs. When demonstrations turn into riots, the police are not told to restore order but to stand down. That's not progress.

We are not having a serious conversation about race.

We are not having a serious conversation about criminal justice reform. 

We are not having a serious conversation about policing. 

We are not having a serious conversation about the breakdown of the family.

What America really needs is a national effort led by the black community, supported by corporate America and politicians of both parties that empowers law enforcement to rid our communities of gangs and drugs. 

That would be a day worth celebrating.

Cena Kowtows To Communist China

I'm sure you've seen the stories of John Cena's pathetic, abject apology to communist China. If you enjoy the Fast & Furious movie series, I strongly urge you to skip the latest installment. 

For those not familiar with Cena, this "tough guy" groveled at the feet of the Chinese Communist Party, which is committing genocide, and is most likely responsible for killing 600,000 Americans.

Mr. Cena wasn't counting dead Americans or dead Uyghurs. He was counting the possible loss of dollars from his bank account.  His sin or "mistake" as he put it in his online apology -- in Mandarin Chinese no less -- was calling Taiwan a country. 

Now if you live in mainland China and call Taiwan a country, you're in deep trouble. There is no free speech in communist China. But that's not breaking news. 

What is breaking news is that there is evidently no free speech in America if you're aspiring to do business in communist China. 

But wait – wasn't trade with communist China supposed to change communist China? Sadly, as I have repeatedly warned, it has changed us instead! 

The toughest of tough guys will grovel at the feet of communist Chinese butchers if it makes them money. As Sen. Marco Rubio put it, "A world where China's Communist Party controls what Americans can say isn't some nightmarish future threat. It's already here."

I served as a Trump-appointee on the U.S. Commission for International Religious Freedom with a Uyghur Muslim named Nury Turkel. He's not a guy with bulging muscles. 

But when he got a very clear message from Beijing that his family in China will suffer if he continues speaking out against the communist government, Nury did not hesitate for a second to continue speaking the truth. If I'm in a fight in a dark alley and have the choice of Mr. Turkel or Mr. Cena to be at my side, I'll pick Nury every time.

Clarke Confirmed

Kristen Clarke, Joe Biden's choice to serve as head of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, was confirmed by the Senate yesterday in a 51 to 48 vote. As I have previously documented, Clarke is totally unfit to lead the Civil Rights Division. 

But it was deeply disturbing that 51 senators voted for her this week of all weeks when anti-Semitism has been in the news. 

While Clarke was at Harvard, and I quote now the words of Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell who led the fight against her, "Ms. Clarke invited, welcomed introduced and then defended a famously anti-Semitic guest speaker who authored a book literally titled The Jewish Onslaught." 

While we're on the subject of anti-Semitism, here's another example of just how extreme the left has become. 

Amer Zahr came to this country as a child from a Palestinian refugee camp in Jordan. He grew up here. He was educated here, earning a law degree from the University of Michigan. Zahr served as spokesman for Bernie Sanders's presidential campaign and he financially supported Rep. Rashida Tlaib's campaign.

So what advice was this well-educated, well-connected Palestinian activist offering this past week as Jews were being beaten in the streets of Los Angeles and New York? Zahr urged people to "Stop condemning anti-Semitism. . . It's a distraction. . . It doesn't help." 

Fire Fauci Now!

At a recent hearing, Senator Rand Paul confronted Dr. Anthony Fauci about whether the agency he leads ever funded "gain of function research" at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. 

"Gain of function research" is the process of altering a virus to make it more contagious or deadly to humans. Fauci vehemently denied that he had approved such funding, saying, "That categorically was not done."

But like most categorical statements Dr. Fauci has said, his previous comments weren't so categorical. 

Testifying before a House committee yesterday, Fauci conceded that a grant was made to a third party knowing it would be passed on to the Wuhan lab. Or as Dr. Fauci put it, the grant was just "a modest collaboration with very respectable Chinese scientists who were world experts on coronavirus." 

Today, Fauci conceded even more, saying "There's no way of guaranteeing" that the Chinese communists didn't lie to him or mislead him.

Perjury is hard to prove, but Fauci is skating on thin ice. His constant flip-flopping explains why his favorability ratings have swung 22 points to the negative in the past year, and why 65% of Americans say "political considerations" have influenced his decisions on COVID.