For the first time in years, Federal Reserve officials will hold their latest policy meeting this week feeling broadly satisfied with where interest rates are and with seemingly no inclination to change them anytime soon. Chairman Jerome Powell has expressed a sense of gratification with Fed policy, thanks to a steady if unspectacular economy driven by a robust job market. The unemployment rate is at a 50-year low. Economic growth remains solid if modest at a roughly 2% annual rate. With inflation low, the Fed could potentially stand pat for months. Yet even with the Fed seemingly comfortable with the range of its benchmark rate — a historically low 1.5% to 1.75% — questions about its policy-making remain.

General Motors is spending $2.2 billion to refurbish an underused Detroit factory so it can build a series of electric and self-driving vehicles, eventually employing 2,200 people. GM said in a statement Monday that the factory will start building the company’s first electric pickup late in 2021, followed by a funky-looking self-driving shuttle for GM’s Cruise autonomous vehicle unit. The truck will be the first of several electric vehicles to be built at the plant, which straddles the border between Detroit and the enclave of Hamtramck. The company has plans to revive the Hummer nameplate for one of the vehicles. In November of 2018 GM announced plans to close the factory along with three others in the U.S.

Presidential politics move fast. What we’re watching heading into a new week on the 2020 campaign: ___ Days to Iowa caucuses: 7 Days to general election: 281 ___ THE NARRATIVE After almost one year of primary drama, the Iowa caucuses are just a week away. Expect to hear a frenzy of expectation spinning and closing arguments focused on electability. At the same time, simmering tensions within the Democratic Party are apparent. Establishment officials are struggling to mask their concern about Bernie Sanders’ strength with polls showing the self-described democratic socialist running strong in both Iowa and New Hampshire. Joe Biden seems to be strengthening his bid to emerge as the establishment favorite, yet he continues to struggle to generate excitement on the ground.

A divided Supreme Court on Monday allowed the Trump administration to put in place a policy connecting the use of public benefits with whether immigrants could become permanent residents. The new policy can be used to deny green cards to immigrants over their use of public benefits including Medicaid, food stamps and housing vouchers, as well as other factors. The justices’ order came by a 5-4 vote and reversed a ruling from the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York that had kept in a place a nationwide hold on the policy following lawsuits that have been filed against it. The court’s four liberal justices, Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor, would have prevented the policy from taking effect.

The lawyer for the suspect in the stabbing during a Chanukah party in Monsey has requested a federal competency evaluation. Attorney Michael Sussman says a psychiatrist concluded that Grafton Thomas is not competent to stand trial. Now the U.S. Attorney’s office has two weeks to respond. Thomas has pleaded not guilty to attempted murder charges in the Dec. 28th stabbing that left five people injured at Rabbi Rottenberg’s home in Forshay. The 37-year-old also faces federal hate crime charges. Sussman issued a statement to reporters saying that he had asked the federal court, where Thomas faces hate-crime charges, to keep his motion, Levin’s report, and other documents under seal, to retain the privacy of personal health matters.

Rav Eliezer Ozer Sari, z’l, 77, drowned in the Zupnik mivkah on Rechov Strauss in Geulah early Monday morning. R’ Sari, z’l, a resident of Mevaseret Tzion was noheig to toivel in a mikvah and daven vasikin at the Kosel every morning. Every day, he left his home at 3 a.m., drove to the Zupnik mikvah and would then continue to the Kosel to daven at the vasikin minyan for Shacharis. He would then spend the rest of the day in Mea Shearim learning Torah with chavrusahs, B’Chadrei Chareidim reported. R’ Sari’s friends in Mevasert Tzion described him as “a man of chessed, active in the community, a modest man who quietly did great things, a ba’al tzedaka – and he did everything anonymously. We can’t believe that we lost a man like this.

Mesibas L’Chaim in honor of the appointment of Harav Naftula Yakov Padva as dayan in the Bais Hora’ah of Toms River under the leadership of Harav Yechiel Malik
The post Photo Essay: Hachtara Of HaRav Naftali Yaakov Padva As Dayan In The Bais Hora’ah of Toms River appeared first on The Yeshiva World.

“We make no apologies for setting high standards.” The bar has officially been raised. The Waterfront, an adult day healthcare center, celebrated a white glove ribbon cutting amidst much pomp and ceremony. Amongst the attendees were Congressman Kalman Yeger and other influential politicians and celebrity entertainers. An introduction to the new era of senior daycare was an occasion that they were hard-pressed to miss. The crowds were entranced by the quality of the entertainment and the standards of the event. Shalom Lemer’s sweet voice rang out, Marc Garfinkel’s illusionary tactics enraptured, and the offerings of SoHo Platters were a feast for the eye and an explosion for the palate. The Waterfront did not disappoint in any aspect.

Survivors of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp recalled their suffering as they marked the 75th anniversary of its liberation, returning to the place where they lost entire families and warning about the ominous growth of anti-Semitism and hatred in the world. “We have with us the last living survivors, the last among those who saw the Holocaust with their own eyes,” Polish President Andrzej Duda told the dignitaries at the commemoration, which included the German president as well as Jewish, Christian and Muslim leaders. “The magnitude of the crime perpetrated in this place is terrifying but we must not look away from it and we must never forget it,” Duda said.

Michael Bloomberg on Sunday made his case for the presidency to fellow Jewish Americans, vowing not to revisit U.S. aid to Israel — an approach that contrasts Bloomberg with several of his Democratic rivals, including his only fellow Jewish candidate in the race, Bernie Sanders. Bloomberg, at a speech announcing a coalition of Jewish American supporters in Florida, vowed he would “never impose conditions” on U.S. military aid to Israel if elected. Sanders and rivals Elizabeth Warren and Pete Buttigieg have all left open the option of leveraging that aid to dissuade the Israeli government from annexation and settlement expansions in the West Bank. “As president, I will always have Israel’s back,” said Bloomberg, who served three terms as mayor of New York.