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ANN ALTHOUSE ROUNDS UP Inane War-on-Women headlines of the day, from The Washington Post. There’s a lot of Hillary2016 battlespace prep going on under the radar. These people never stop.

TEMPERATURE DROP: Record Great Lakes Ice Coverage Will Control Spring Weather. “Although spring may be in full swing, more than one-third of the Great Lakes remains covered in ice. The harsh cold from this past winter resulted in extensive ice coverage over the Great Lakes, making it the second highest ice cover on record for the lakes. . . . In addition to causing cooler weather around the lakes and areas downwind in the Northeast well into spring, the ice has had a negative impact on a variety of businesses that are dependent on the lakes to transport materials.” Related: Great Lakes Ice Extent Twice Previous Record.

Fallen Angels was just a science fiction novel. Right? Right?

BUT IT MAKES WARREN BUFFET RICH(ER): The Opaque Dangers Of Oil-By-Rail.

America is in the middle of an oil and gas boom, and it’s pumping out hydrocarbons faster than it can build out infrastructure to transport them to markets. This has put a new strain on America’s extensive rail networks, which have been bringing crude from new fields in remote places like North Dakota’s Bakken formation to refineries, sometimes as far away as the Gulf Coast. With more freight cars comes more accidents. Train crashes are already destructive enough to warrant their own idiom, but when oil is involved, the risks to health and environment are compounded. Complicating the matter further, the crude being transported is of a particularly explosive variety.

To help minimize risk, railroads are required to send hazardous materials—like crude oil—along the safest routes possible. But as the NYT reports, there’s very little oversight to this process. . . .

Of course, there is an alternative: build out our nation’s already extensive oil pipeline network. Pipelines are ultimately the most efficient way to bring hydrocarbons from large fields to large refineries, and they’re also safer than transporting crude by rail or truck.

As the shale revolution continues to yield millions of barrels of tight oil, it makes sense from both cost and safety perspectives to expand and extend our pipelines. That includes the Keystone XL pipeline.

Heck, even Warren’s come out in favor of that.

CHANGE: China on course to become ‘world’s most Christian nation’ within 15 years. “By 2030, China’s total Christian population, including Catholics, would exceed 247 million, placing it above Mexico, Brazil and the United States as the largest Christian congregation in the world, he predicted.”

The government is concerned because the churches form an alternate power center, and sometimes a locus of resistance.

ESPECIALLY TEA PARTIERS? IRS Uses Private Company to Track Taxpayer License Plates.

AT AMAZON, Featured Deals in Video Games.

Also, up to 35% off on Flashlights.

My brother and I were playing with this powerful item the other night. Candlepower, as he likes to say, is authority.

SEX, BOOZE, AND QUOTAS: The troubles at Dartmouth. “Binge drinking is a huge issue on campuses across the country, and fraternity hazing can be cruel and dangerous. But fraternities are not, by and large, the cause of the breakdown of civil and responsible behavior at Dartmouth or other colleges. Dartmouth could ban fraternities tomorrow, and students would still get plastered every weekend, and young women would still wake up after drunken hookups feeling like they’ve been assaulted (and they aren’t entirely wrong). What’s more, minority students who’ve been admitted with lower grades and test scores through misguided affirmative action programs would still feel alienated and find themselves the objects of unfortunate stereotyping.”

Dartmouth’s applications are in steep decline already (14 percent last year). Making it a place where men are stigmatized and PC reigns won’t help that. If you want to curb student partying, how about reinstating tough academic standards and eliminating grade inflation. Oh, wait, that won’t help applications either . . . .

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Mid-Continent U. Will Close. “The university has been financially struggling, and facing rumors about a possible closure for months. All employees received layoff notices, and the university hopes that some faculty members will volunteer to allow a final cohort of students to graduate.”

BUREAUCRATS NEED TO BE KEPT IN FEAR, BECAUSE THIS IS HOW THEY ACT WHEN THEY’RE UNAFRAID: Crushed by the bureaucrats: The brilliant cardiologist who turned whistleblower to save lives talks of his brutal 13-year persecution and why he believes NHS managers are destroying a great service. One of the most useful things you can do is to publicize their names. They hate accountability, and like to hide behind institutions.

CHARLES COOKE: Gun owners flying through N.Y and N.J. shouldn’t be arrested when they check their guns. No, they shouldn’t be.

This is something I talk about in my Second Amendment Penumbras piece.

PUBLIC PENSION UPDATE: Detroit Gives Pensioners a Sleight of Hand.

Detroit doesn’t have any money. Rather, it doesn’t have enough money: It cannot both pay its debts and run the city. That’s why the city filed for bankruptcy some months back, over the outraged protests of pensioners who stand to lose a big chunk of their monthly checks.

Today, those pensioners are breathing a little easier. The city seems to have struck a deal that will leave their pensions in better shape than previously feared. Instead of cutting those monthly checks by as much as a third, the city will trim them by less than 5 percent.

How did they make such a big change? In part by assuming higher investment returns.

This will end well.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Student debt holds back many would-be home buyers. “Of the many factors holding back young home buyers — rising prices, tougher lending standards, a still-shaky job market — none looms larger than the recent explosion of college debt.”

Unexpectedly!

NO PLACE FOR THE MIDDLE CLASS in the Democrats’ Top/Bottom Coalition.

The plight of the middle class in cities like Chicago can’t be blamed entirely on liberal policies. The global economy has clearly benefited the talented, the educated, and the already wealthy, often at the expense of those in formerly middle-class occupations, like manufacturing. And it’s unlikely that the forces unleashed by globalization will diminish. One might expect, then, that big-city Democratic leaders like Emanuel or de Blasio would make a strong appeal to middle-class constituents.

They haven’t, because for liberal mayors, middle-class decline is convenient and politically advantageous. Much of America’s moneyed elite has already shifted its allegiance to the Left, especially in cities. Wealthy, educated urbanites hold generally liberal social values and can afford the higher taxes “blue” cities like Chicago impose—especially when those taxes help pay for the upscale amenities they desire. Even when the mayoral administration is less friendly, the urban elite tends to get its needs met. At the same time, the urban poor have remained loyal to the Democrats, no matter how little tangible improvement liberal policies make in their lives. And the various unions, community organizers, and activist groups that advocate for the poor profit handsomely from the moneys directed toward liberal antipoverty programs.

This is the Democratic Party’s new top-bottom coalition, one in which the traditional middle class—white ethnics, blue-collar manufacturing and trade workers, small business owners, and others—has no part.

It’s not all that new, but yeah.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE, LEGAL EDUCATION EDITION: Professor Bainbridge: Rank-Ordering The Likelihood of Law School Reforms.

21ST CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: “For most strong, successful women, the alpha male of old isn’t the best match. . . . A strong woman will reap the benefit of this kind of respectful, responsible beta man; he will be more flexible, more nurturing and more willing to share the responsibilities of family life.”

That’s nice. What’s in it for him?

BLUE COLLAR PARADE: Booming Energy Sector Pushing More Minority Employment.

FREE SPEECH IN OBAMA’S AMERICA: War On Free Speech: Starkville, Mississippi Aldermen Want Twitter Parodist Arrested.