News roundup
(1) What’s going on with the riots in France? The original story was that it was about high school students protesting education problems, but that appears to only be a small part of the story:
Harvey Feigenbaum, a professor of political science and international affairs at George Washington University and an expert on French politics, told Fox News Digital that France’s underlying problem is a government caught between expensive social commitments, sluggish economic growth and mounting pressure to cut spending.
“France is in deep debt. It wants to cut its expenses,” Feigenbaum said, explaining that years of financial pressure and neglected school facilities have fueled frustration among students.
The scale of the financial predicament is striking. According to Eurostat, French public debt stood at 117.6% of GDP in the first quarter of 2026, the third-highest ratio in the European Union, behind Greece and Italy.
Reuters reported Oct. 8 that rising borrowing costs and investor concerns have severely limited the government’s ability to resolve unrest through additional spending, a strategy employed during previous waves of French protests.
The financial squeeze has collided with an increasingly fragmented political system, creating opportunities for parties at both ends of the political spectrum to capitalize on public dissatisfaction. …
Insoumise party, known as LFI, led by Jean-Luc Mélenchon, became an increasingly contentious issue.
Reuters reported Oct. 1 that French intelligence agencies had told a government crisis meeting that LFI and affiliated activists played a role in fomenting the unrest. Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez also cited agitators moving between schools to encourage violence.
LFI is a far-left party.
And then there are the Muslims, who are also involved, either as demonstrators or as influencers:
And what about the “Al Aqsa flood” slogan tagged on the wall of the Sorbonne? What about the obsession with the “Free Palestine” slogan, the “We’re all the children of Gaza,” heard in each and every demonstration? Can it illuminate the constant Palestinian, Lebanese, and Algerian flags deployed during most of the riots between Oct. 1 and Oct. 7, which then receded after Oct. 8? …
Whether an agreement has been made between LFI and crypto-Islamist groups to let them freely celebrate Oct. 7 inside of the demonstrations can only be a matter of speculation. But it’s certainly hard to miss the prevalence of Palestinian flags during the first week of October.
(2) The Cornell rape case gets weaker and weaker as more information emerges.
Many of today’s young women want it both ways: complete sexual freedom and complete protection from harm, as well as from the consequences of their actions.
(3) Ilham Omar’s house has been raided by HSI (Homeland Security Investigations):
Two sources close to the investigation say the search stems from a criminal fraud investigation into the Somali-born congresswoman’s immigration paperwork, which was filled out by her late father when she was a child.
So, if she was a child, I don’t see that she faces any criminal liability for this.
(4) There’s no evidence that Talarico was in a mental health facility in Ohio. That recording seemed bogus to me and so I didn’t cover it.
That doesn’t answer the question of what actually has been going on with Talarico.
(5) El Sayed’s half-sister wrote years ago that the family has long been connected with the Muslim Brotherhood.
Eman Abdelhadi, an assistant professor at the University of Chicago, wrote openly about her family’s ties to the Muslim Brotherhood in social media posts in 2012 and 2013, the Washington Free Beacon found.
El-Sayed has denied it, of course.
Item (1): I never believed for an instant that the unrest in France really had to do with education issues. Why do I believe this? Because I think the late David Horowitz was 100 percent on target when he said/wrote,
“An SDS radical once wrote, ‘The issue is never the issue. The issue is always the revolution.’ In other words the cause – whether inner city blacks or women – is never the real cause, but only an occasion to advance the real cause which is the accumulation of power to make the revolution.”
https://quotefancy.com/quote/1943805/David-Horowitz-An-SDS-radical-once-wrote-The-issue-is-never-the-issue-The-issue-is-always
What I wonder is what Omar’s citizenship status is, if her father lied on his application.
Re: Omar – Has anyone seen any serious analysis of the relevant immigration law? The allegations that have circulated at places like powerlineblog are that her true father was a general during the Somali civil war and was alleged to have committed war crimes. He then, purportedly, lied about his children’s identity so that he or they could claim asylum. If there’s anything to that, it’s a lot more serious than the other things the Trump DOJ has alleged against political enemies, BUT:
Is there truly anything that could be done about that now? For better or worse, we’re hooked into the “it’s a crime that we can prosecute right now, or it’s completely OK” paradigm. If the true answer is that it is too late to address the issue now, Omar will claim that she has been “exonerated,” and, for purposes of public opinion, she most likely will be.
And, is the Trump administration really going to try to revoke the citizenship of a member of Congress? Wow. If they’re going to actually run that play, that had better have slam dunk evidence and a slam dunk interpretation of the relevant law.
If they’re just playing the “process is the punishment” routine, they’re only playing into Omar’s hands. She already claims to be a martyr. They’ll just make her more of one.
On (3), I wonder if those sources are correct that this is about immigration fraud. I agree with neo that she would not have criminal liability for something her father did. But it would not surprise me if they were trying to uncover money laundering or other types of fraud (if those are in DHS’s bailiwick).
Once again CC™-R shows faux concern about the veracity of Ill ham Oh Mars ( a real alien life form) citizenship through not so subtle questioning of “places like powerlineblog.”
Followed by his usual hand wringing; but can “we” actually do anything? Like enforce the law?
But if course CC™-R finishes his agitprop with a stab at The Great Orange Whale.
Reasons.
Oh noes! Another Minnesota martyr! The Great Orange Whale will never “lear!”
“Ilham Omar’s house has been raided by HSI .”
Yep, the feds were looking for Melania’s underwear.