Genesis: Crime and punishment.

Mankind's archetypal crime, Cain's murder of Abel, points to a persistent flaw in human nature: It is always easier to tear the other guy down, than to try to improve yourself.

The consequence in politics is that it is easier to erase the progress of others, so as to give yourself a lower bar by which to be judged. It's hard to stand tall among temples and skyscrapers; easier, on a plain filled with rubble.

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G-d showed mercy to Cain, and what's the thanks He got? Mankind devolved into violence. The mark of Cain, meant to protect the killer from arbitrary mob justice, became a status symbol. Four generations later, Lemech could brag, "I've killed a man for wounding me, and a boy for bruising me - if Cain was avenged 7 times, then Lemech for 77." Mankind had perverted G-d's compassion into a literal license to kill. No wonder He's pissed.

After the Flood, G-d decrees that there are going to be some new rules. "Who sheds the blood of man, by man shal his blood be shed."

USA: President Trump at CPAC.

Full speech here.

Transcript via UPI.

North Korea / USA: Trump, Kim meet in Hanoi for summit.

Breitbart:

Thousands flocked to see President Donald Trump arrive in Vietnam on Tuesday for the diplomatic summit with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un.

Trump landed at the Hanoi airport early evening and was welcomed by over a dozen Vietnamese officials and American diplomats.

He traveled about 30 minutes to his hotel, as thousands of people lined the streets to welcome the president, according to reporters. Many of the locals waved U.S. and Vietnamese flags. ...

Austin Bay at StrategyPage on DJT and US/NK diplomacy:

This “first brush” narrative in this section describes ongoing history. It collects illustrative, connected events and actions that occurred from March 2017 to March 2018. When examined in concert, theysketch a concerted effort to wage twenty-first-century “cocktail” warfare by employing and coordinating American power in pursuit of a geo-strategic goal: denuclearizing North Korea. Subsequent events will determine the effectiveness of this particular multi-dimensional operation.

The Coercive Diplomacy narrative actually begins with Donald Trump’s October 24, 1999 Meet the Press interview with Tim Russert.

The interview is a historically illuminating flash forward to his administration’s 2017–2018 “de-nuclearizing” North Korea coercivediplomatic effort. It also adds convincing depth to the US narrativethat “North Korea has gone too far.” ...

Portland: Antifa at town hall meeting.

Via Andy Ngo at YouTube. Andy's account of the incident follows:

'On Feb. 22, 2019 at a "listening session" at Maranatha Church organized by the Portland Police chief on policing issues, the public raged at her, the mayor, and conservatives who showed up. The previous week, a slanted report from Willamette Week portrayed Portland Police Lt. Niiya as a "collaborator" with Patriot Prayer, a right-wing protest group. The public and city council expressed outcry, despite the fact that it was the responsibility of Niiya to build rapport with a variety of protesters to gather intel. The intel he gathered was fed directly to the Mayor's office to track protest plans. Niiya has been removed from his position and Mayor Wheeler demanded an investigation into him following the report's release. At the town hall meeting, citizens called police chief Danielle Outlaw a "traitor" to black and brown people, and demanded that Portland Police be disbanded. At one point, Haley Adams, a Jewish right-wing activist, yelled at the panel for allowing the public to mistreat the few conservative speakers (an elderly woman was told to sit down; an elderly man was called 'racist'). Adams was surrounded and called "Nazi Scum." She was kicked out for disorderly behavior.'

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Israel opens Rwanda embassy.

Arutz Sheva:

Israel opened its first embassy in Rwanda on Friday, offering support to the East Africa nation from health to education and agriculture, as well as communication technology including cyber-security, AFP reported.

"This country shares a lot of similarities with state of Israel and offers a lot of ground for mutual cooperation," new Israeli ambassador Ron Adam said after meeting with Rwanda's President Paul Kagame.

Rwanda, a largely Christian nation, has said it is keen to encourage tourists to the country, especially to see its famous mountain gorillas.

Rwandair, the national airline, has said it will begin direct flights to Israel in 2019. ...

Leaving the hipster ghetto.

Long story short, I moved out of Portland at the end of 2017 for a live/work situation near Scappoose. That didn't work out, and I went back to work last summer (2018) in Beaverton. I'm now living and working in Hillsboro.

I like the Portland area, but it's unlikely that I will move back to Portland proper. When I first moved to the city, I found it walkable, liveable, affordable, and generally nice. Things are different now.

I no longer find Portland endearingly quirky. Between the rent, the crowding, the traffic, and Antifa apparently being given free rein in the streets, I'm content with my nostalgic memories of living downtown.

Follow Andy Ngo on Twitter and on YouTube to keep up with the latest from Portland and the culture wars generally.

Nigeria: Voters to elect president.

The main contenders are the incumbent, Muhammadu Buhari of APC, and challenger Atiku Abubakar of PDP.
AllAfrica:

The decision of who becomes Nigeria's next president will be taken tomorrow by about 72 million persons who have so far collected their permanent voter's cards (PVCs).

According to data released by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), a total of 72,775,502 million Nigerians have collected their PCVs and now qualify to cast their votes in tomorrow's polls to elect Nigeria's president for the next four years.

They will also be voting in their constituencies to elect legislators in the federal parliament, that is, the Senate and House of Representatives of the National Assembly.

Atiku exhorts voters to "remove Buhari".

Buhari emerged Nigeria's president in 2015 after defeating Jonathan in the 2015 presidential election. Buhari polled 15,424,921, while the incumbent president Goodluck Jonathan polled 12,853,162.

Atiku, who was Nigeria's vice president from 1999 till 2007, has appealed to Nigerians to express their powers by voting out Buhari and elect him president.

"On March 28, 2015, we the people of Nigeria went to our polling units and only with our PVCs and yet we were able to remove an incumbent President from office. That made me very proud to be a Nigerian and very proud to be a Democrat," Atiku said in a video on his twitter handle.

"This Saturday, we will have the opportunity of doing so again. My message to you is simple: Please come out and vote as this election is about your future and the future of our great nation. On election day, we are all equal as no single vote is more important than the other."

Buhari's message to Nigerians.

Here are the key points of the President's broadcast:

1. Democracy is far from the easiest thing to achieve and maintain.

2. Democracy requires "a combination of patience, tolerance, compassion, diligence, wisdom and hope", the traits which exist in Nigerians.

3. No "worldly hand" can deter Nigeria from continuing its democracy.

4. Nigerians were commended for their patience and peaceful conduct so far during this electoral season and especially during this intervening week following the postponement of the February 16 elections.

5. INEC must realise the profound and weighty duty that rests upon it to conduct free, fair and transparent elections. ...

Read the rest at the link.

Kenya: Terrorists attack hotel in Nairobi.

Long War Journal: Shabaab says attack followed Zawahiri guidelines.

In addition to the jihadists’ general opposition to Israel, the name of the operation is also intended to seize upon President Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

Indeed, Shabaab claims Trump’s decision was “an attempt to confer legitimacy upon the illegitimate Zionist regime.” Trump and “his cohorts granted the Zionist Jews the approval to desecrate the sanctity of one of Islam’s holiest sites with their filth and vile policies of ethnic cleansing,” the al Qaeda arm’s men write.

Shabaab says that its “Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan Battalion” (or Brigade) was responsible for the assault. That same unit, which is named after an al Qaeda veteran who was killed in 2009, has conducted numerous high-profile operations in the past, including the July 2010 bombings in Kampala, Uganda and the Jan. 15, 2016 raid on an AMISOM base in El Adde, among others. Nabhan, who swore allegiance to al Qaeda’s senior leadership on behalf of Shabaab in 2008, was long wanted by the US for his role in the 1998 US Embassy bombings, as well as attacks in Mombasa, Kenya in 2002. The latter operations targeted an Israeli-owned hotel and airliner.

Arutz Sheva: Terrorists cited Trump, Jerusalem recognition.

The group said in a statement picked up by the SITE monitoring group that its fighters stormed the DusitD2 complex on instructions by Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri.

"It is a response to the witless remarks of the US president, Donald Trump, and his declaration of Al-Quds (Jerusalem) as the capital of Israel," said Al-Shabaab.

The East African: American 9/11 survivor Jason Spindler among victims.

An American who survived the 9/11 terror attack is among those who were killed in Tuesday’s terror attack at Nairobi’s 14 Riverside Drive.

Jason Spindler’s mother Sarah Sandler told NBC News that her son “was trying to make positive change in the third world in emerging markets.”

Spindler’s brother, Jonathan, also confirmed the family’s tragic loss via Facebook.

“It is with a heavy heart that I have to report that my brother, Jason Spindler passed away this morning during a terror attack in Nairobi, Kenya. Jason was a survivor of 9/11 and a fighter. I am sure he gave them hell!” Jonathan’s post read.

Nigeria: Troops retake Baga.

AllAfrica: Nigerian troops retake Baga from Boko Haram.

The military had repeatedly denied that Boko Haram captured Baga after dislodging soldiers of the Nigeria military, including those of the Multi National Joint Task Force. But in the statement issued by the army spokesman, Sani Usman, said troops were able to reclaim the community after a heated gunbattle.

Daily Trust (Abuja): 'A statement from army spokesman, Brigadier General Sani Usman said the 707 Special Forces Brigade dealt the decisive blow that neutralized several terrorists along that axis. He said, "The Special Forces commenced clearance operations on 28th December 2018, where they cleared Zare, Gudumbali, Kukawa and Cross Kauwa without any resistance from suspected terrorists." Usman said, "Though some of the terrorists attempted to infiltrate troops camp at Monguno, the gallant troops lured them and neutralized many of them and recovered some arms and ammunition."'
This Day (Lagos): 'An Army officer and a soldier were killed while five soldiers wounded as Nigerian military engaged Boko Haram terrorists in a gritty battle that led to the death of over 80 terrorists in different battlegrounds notably in Baga Naval Base, which was recently reclaimed; Cross Kauwa and Monguno in Borno State. This is coming as Nigeria and China signed a N2billion Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to offer assistance to the Nigerian military in order to strengthen its counter-insurgency measures.'

WalkAway

My post in the #WalkAway campaign.

I grew up in Connecticut, in a liberal home; but the word meant something different then. My parents were old-school liberals - Kennedy Democrats. Mom in particular had no use for Communism, and admired Soviet dissidents like Solzhenitsyn. (Another Soviet dissident of the day - a Jewish activist - would later play an important role in my own thinking.) Our family didn't follow an organized religion, although we were nominally Unitarians.

We were book-lovers and intellectuals, and Mom and Dad instilled a love of learning in my sister and me. But we were also a very troubled family. As a kid I had a love of science and a nerdy bent. (This was in the 1970s, before the computer revolution made geekiness cool. In those days, "nerd" was definitely not a compliment.) I didn't want to spend the rest of my life hiding in books, like in the Simon and Garfunkel song "I Am a Rock."

I joined the military after high school and served 10 years active duty in two branches - the Air Force and the Marines. It was a great challenge and an opportunity to grow as a person. Surrounded by all different kinds of people from very different backgrounds, I learned more than I ever would have learned in a classroom.

I was still independent and unconventional in my thinking, though, including my politics. I spent about seven years as an active member of the Green Party in California and Oregon (where it's known as the Pacific Green Party for historical reasons). This was in the late 1990s and early 2000s. I liked the camaraderie and the sense of engagement. Even then, though, I probably would have identified my politics as "classical liberal" (rather than "progressive" or "leftist") - which put me firmly to the right-of-center among my fellow Greens!

As a young adult I had started to gravitate toward religion, first learning Hebrew (so as to understand the Bible better) and eventually attending synagogue services on a regular basis. The party chapter I belonged to was not anti-Zionist or anti-Semitic as far as I could tell, but I realized with growing unease that this could not be said of many of our comrades on the Left. I also noticed a strange affinity for radical Islam in some corners. The local "progressive" newspaper (oh, how I wish I'd saved that copy) ran a glowing article on the role of Islam in western Asia. That issue was published in the summer of 2001.

The September 11 attacks forced me to re-think a lot of things, but it wasn't until 2003, I think, that I officially left the Greens and joined the Democratic Party. The primaries were underway, and one of the early Democratic hopefuls was an Orthodox Jewish Senator from my home state, who struck me as a decent man and a principled liberal of the old style. I got to hear him speak once at my synagogue.

Senator Joe Lieberman dropped out of the primary on February 3, 2004, and that was my #WalkAway moment. It was clear that the Democratic Party and I were headed in different directions. I changed my registration to Republican the next day.

In the following months I began following Republican politics and learning more about conservatism. I avidly followed the freewheeling debates in National Review Online's 'The Corner'. I discovered that conservatism had nothing in common with the caricatured image presented in the news media and in TV shows like 'All in the Family'. I came to understand the importance of small government, individual liberty, and free markets. I also started to understand the role of social institutions - churches, fraternities, and even families - in a healthy, functioning Republic. And I also started to see the media bias more and more clearly.

Fast forward through the Obama years (please!) and to the recent elections. I was a Ted Cruz guy in the primaries, and did not know what to make of this Donald Trump character. I thought his supporters seemed like zealots, and a little bit unhinged. I followed the debates in the news, on the blogs, on YouTube and Facebook. And I noticed something strange: as crazy as the pro-Trump people sometimes sounded, the anti-Trump people were worse. Even among supposed Republicans and conservatives.

So I voted for Trump in the general election, not knowing what to expect, but knowing for darn sure I wasn't going to vote for Hillary Rodham Clinton. The Obama years had convinced me that the people at the helm of the Democratic Party were not simply misguided or over-zealous reformers - they were anti-American. The deaths at Benghazi, and the untimely demise of numerous persons inconvenient to the Clintons, convinced me that something very dark and sinister was afoot.

When I started listening to what Trump was actually saying - instead of what the media were telling me he was saying - I started to like what I was hearing. Grow the economy, fight illegal immigration, move the US Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem - sounds great! But would a President Trump actually do any of those things?

Now we are getting our answer. In retrospect I realize that my fellow Republican voters called it right.

Our Nation - our Republic - is something unique and precious in the world. We are blessed with freedoms few other nations enjoy (even the so-called "democratic" nations of Europe), and with a rich intellectual and spiritual heritage. But we live in a difficult world, where totalitarian forces would like to see us defeated. Our security and our liberty depend on our strength as a nation.

It's good to be independent in your thinking, but it's also good to understand where other folks are coming from, and to understand the importance of traditions and of institutions. We need freedom, but we also need purpose. ("Man's search for meaning is the primary motivation in his life." - Viktor Frankl, 'Man's Search for Meaning') We need to be individuals, but we draw strength from a larger identity. ("The enemy's will is strong because his identity is strong. And we must match his strength of purpose with strong identities of our own." - Natan Sharansky, 'Defending Identity')

The ancient Israelites walked away from slavery in Egypt, not knowing where they were headed. They wandered in the wilderness for weeks before receiving the Torah that gave their lives meaning, and years more before settling in the homeland where they would build a national identity.

The search for meaning and identity is the work of a lifetime - but the first step is to #WalkAway.

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Financial Times: Portland near bottom in fiscal health index.

KATU:

PORTLAND, Ore. — The city of Portland is currently about $3.4 billion in debt and ranks near the bottom of a national "fiscal health index."

The Fiscal Times evaluated the finances of 116 U.S. cities with populations greater than 200,000 and ranked Portland No. 103 last year.

Officials say Portland's debt has risen by more than 20 percent over the past 10 years from $2.82 billion in 2008.

The city currently pays more than $500 million annually to service its debt, which includes both principal and interest. The city's total budget this year is $5.1 billion. ...

Go to the KATU link for a breakout and analysis of the debt from city debt manager Eric Johansen.

China / New Zealand: Concern over PRC influence in NZ.

Business Insider:

A former CIA analyst has raised the prospect of kicking New Zealand out of an international intelligence-sharing alliance, which includes the US.

Five Eyes is the name of the intelligence alliance between the US, UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand that has routinely shared sensitive intelligence since 1955. But failure to respond to interference attempts by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) should endanger New Zealand's membership, Peter Mattis, a former CIA China expert testified to the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission last month.

"In New Zealand, both the last prime minister, Bill English, and Jacinda Ardern, have denied that there's a problem at all," Mattis, now a fellow at The Jamestown Foundation, said. ...