I DUNNO, BUT I THINK THE RACE-DISCRIMINATION SUITS IN THE IVY LEAGUE WILL PRESENT A PROBLEM: Why did Asian vote dip for Dems?

RON FOURNIER: The Extraordinary Smallness of Washington: Institutional shrinkage marks the politics and governing of the Bush-Obama era. Hmm. My first thought is that the term “Bush-Obama era” would be convenient for Hillary — and maybe other Democrats — who want to distance themselves from Obama’s presidency. . . .

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DON SURBER: Jonathan Gruber And The Credentialed Class. I’m beginning to feel that America’s educational system hasn’t produced the best-possible governing class.

Related: Gruber featured in anti-Landrieu ad in Louisiana. I suspect this is the first of many such.

ROLL CALL: With New House Democratic Leadership Team, Pelosi Looks Out for Her Own. She generally does.

CRACKDOWN: Hong Kong officials clear barricades from road near main protest site.

SAY, DID YOU KNOW JAY NIXON IS A DEMOCRAT? Mo. governor declares state of emergency in expectation of more Ferguson unrest.

UPDATE: Roger Simon: Suppose They Gave a ‘Ferguson’ and Nobody Came?

PRAGER UNIVERSITY: Is The Customer Always Right?

JUAN WILLIAMS: Say It Loud: Black, GOP, and Proud.

As a black Democrat I have to say: 2014 was a marquee year for black Republicans.

But the reaction from the NAACP and black Democrats has been revulsion.

Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.), a member of the Democratic House leadership, dismissed Republican South Carolina Senator Tim Scott’s victory as insignificant: “If you call progress electing a [black] person … who votes against the interests and aspirations of 95 percent of the black people in South Carolina, then I guess that’s progress.”

Another critic of the black Republican ascendency, Darron Smith, wrote in the Huffington Post that Mia Love’s achievement in becoming the first black Republican woman elected to the House is “dangerous.”

“Mia [Love] and others like her are seemingly out of touch with the political realities of African Americans and what remains at stake for them,” he wrote. The election of a conservative black woman, he continued, was “quite dangerous for people of color, sending a message that society is post-racial when, in fact, hate crimes, police shootings of innocent and unarmed black men and boys, and vitriolic online attacks have dramatically increased since the election of our first black president.”

Smith’s harsh appraisal fit with Rep. Charles Rangel’s (D-N.Y.) assessment of the GOP’s midterm wave in the South, in which Republicans ousted Democrats in Arkansas, Georgia and North Carolina. As one of the House’s longest-serving black Democrats, Rangel began by making the fair argument that Republicans in the South are using voter identification laws to suppress black turnout.

But he then drew a line straight from white racists in former slave-holding states to the present-day GOP. Those racists, he asserted, were “frustrated with the Emancipation Proclamation … became Republicans, then Tea Party people.”

Love, Scott and Will Hurd — a 35-year-old former CIA agent who became the first black Republican elected to Congress from Texas since the Civil War — all had far-right backing.

In response to this liberal backlash, Condoleezza Rice, a black southerner and former secretary of State for a Republican president, accused the critics of “fear mongering among minorities just because you disagree with Republicans.”

Secretary Rice is exactly right.

Yeah, she usually is.

EUGENE KONTOROVICH: A TALE OF TWO GREEN LINES.

Efforts by academic groups to impose boycotts and other kinds of punitive measures on Israeli universities have gotten considerable attention lately. However, an opposite phenomenon has escaped notice: the widespread participation by mainstream universities in programs and collaborations with institutions located in occupied territories.

This may surprise those who recall that Israel’s establishment of Ariel University in the West Bank drew earnest condemnation from academics and even foreign ministries around the world. Yet it turns out that Ariel is not the only graduate-level institution established in what much of the international community considers occupied territory. And the others have gotten a very different reception.

Turkey has established 10 universities and many colleges in Northern Cyprus since seizing the territory in an invasion in 1974. Half of the universities are public, state-run institutions, and several are campuses of major Turkish institutions on the mainland. Some of the universities were established in just the past few years.

The United Nations Security Council, the European Court of Human Rights, and most of the international community have condemned the Turkish takeover of one third of the island of Cyprus. As of this writing, no nation other than Turkey recognizes the “Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus” regime by which Ankara controls the territory. Turkey maintains a major settlement program, and settlers from the mainland now account for half or more of the population of the TRNC.

Yet surprisingly, universities in Northern Cyprus have won wide cooperation from institutions and academics elsewhere. Indeed, the growing effort to boycott Israeli institutions often coincides with a welcoming embrace of universities not just in the lands of occupying powers (like Turkey and Russia) but also established in the territories those countries occupy.

Well, but to be fair, they’re not operating in territories occupied by Jews.

CIVIL RIGHTS IN THE 21ST CENTURY: “A refined and sophisticated piece of federal legislation,” that sorts Americans by skin color.

WORRIED ABOUT CAMPUS SEX? LOWER THE DRINKING AGE. “A vast majority of college women’s rape claims involve alcohol. Not long ago, 18-year-olds in many states could drink legally. College-sponsored events could openly involve a keg, with security officers on hand to ensure that things didn’t get out of hand. Since 1984, when the federal government compelled states to adopt a drinking age of 21, college alcohol policies have been a mockery. Prohibition has driven alcohol into private spaces and house parties, with schools largely turning a blind eye.”

WAIT, A REPORTER ASKING A REAL QUESTION? YOU CAN SEE WHY THEY WOULDN’T KNOW HOW TO RESPOND. Reporter’s Gruber question prompts Obamacare flack’s eyeroll.

WILL MARY LANDRIEU FIT UNDER THAT BUS? The Hill: Keystone Stuck At 59 Votes. But who will filibuster?

JOHN HAYWARD: Comet Guy and the social-justice black hole.

Of course, the very point of the mob action is that no conscious offense by Taylor was required for him to be boiled in online oil. Thoughtcrime does not always proceed from deliberate action; intention is divined by the accusers. The goal is to create an atmosphere of terror, in which everyone is double extra careful to pre-censor their words and deeds, and by extension their thoughts, for fear of career destruction.

And it occurs to me that the target of this noisy little radfem band is women, as much as it is men. Women are being programmed through these actions. Offense is being taken on their behalf, to fine-tune the programming of a group mind. A key objective of “War on Women” freak-outs is to push the women who initially dismiss them as ridiculous into accepting them, at least tacitly.

I think they overreached this time.

RICHARD FERNANDEZ: The Split-Level World. “Fortunately the perpetrators are non-Western, so it’s OK.”

AS COL. JEFF COOPER SAID, THE WOLF FEARS NOT THE SHEEP, HOWEVER NUMEROUS: ‘#Shirtstorm’ feminist lynch mob goes after Instapundit’s Glenn Reynolds. Plus, the difference between “Annie Oakley feminists” and “faculty lounge feminists.” It’s disappointing, though, to see mainstream female science journalists outright lie.

Related: The Gunner Girls Reassessment. With Big Bang Theory references. And, of course, we know where Sheldon Cooper comes down.

IGNORANT ARMIES CLASH BY NIGHT: Organizers Train Newly Minted Protesters in St. Louis. “I also think we’re not going to get change in this society unless white people are just a little bit afraid.”

WASHINGTON POST: In Mr. Obama’s own words, acting alone is ‘not how our democracy functions.’

Two thoughts: (1) Expiration date. (2) What makes you think he cares about our democracy?

RON FOURNIER: Obama ‘Destroyed the Credibility of His Administration and Government Itself.’

MARIAH HEDGES: Matt Taylor’s shirt isn’t holding women back – feminism is. “Modern feminists’ focus on behaviour, its propensity for censorship and its increasingly anti-man rhetoric, is creating a dogmatic and divisive feminism that turns women into victims who need protecting from the big, bad world, rather than equipping women with the tools to tackle real issues of gender inequality.”

Soon, women will conclude that they’re so weak that they need a big, bad patriarchy to protect them.

Related:

A movement that once hollered proudly about women’s autonomy, insisting the so-called fairer sex was actually perfectly capable of hurling itself into the rough-and-tumble of public life, now cries about women’s vulnerability, claiming this sex is even fairer than we thought and needs protection from rude images and potty-mouthed men.

What a tragic turnaround. In the space of a couple of generations, feminism has gone from arguing that women were capable to depicting them as fragile; from agitating for increased liberty to demanding tough crackdowns on anyone who possesses sexist or bad or just old-fashioned ideas.

Like I say, they’re willing the patriarchy back into existence.

SO I WROTE ABOUT THIS BISSELL SPOT LIFTER LAST NIGHT, and a reader chimed in: “Got one better: 2+year-old port wine stain on a white plush carpet. I’d been thinking about getting the rug guys in to do a ‘patch’ of sorts or just replace the entire room’s floor covering. After reading your rave review(s) I said, ‘Oh, what the hell…’ and bought the thing. Stain came out on the first try. Very impressive little device…well worth the money.” Yep.

MORE ON THAT RACE-DISCRIMINATION LAWSUIT AGAINST HARVARD: “A lawsuit against Harvard alleges the university limits the number of Asian-Americans it admits each year, arguing that white, black, and Hispanic applicants are given racial preferences over better qualified Asian-American applicants.”

ASHE SCHOW: How to set women in sciences back a decade.

There are not enough women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics jobs, the White House tells us. And they, along with feminists, assure us that sexism is one reason why women don’t enter STEM fields.

“There are many possible factors contributing to the discrepancy of women and men in STEM jobs, including: a lack of female role models, gender stereotyping, and less family-friendly flexibility in the STEM fields,” a U.S. Department of Commerce study claims.

Women need to choose STEM jobs, the White House assures us, because they will earn more and the so-called gender wage gap is smaller.

But what’s keeping women out? Is it that some male scientists wear tacky shirts?

Yeah, that must be it.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: How To Make New Friends As An Adult.