JORDAN HOFFMAN reviews Interstellar.

TAXPROF: The IRS Scandal, Day 548.

YEAH, I SAW THIS: Democratic Committee Vice Chair Melts Down On Twitter and It’s Almost Too Hard to Watch. Almost.

SIGNS POINT TO NO: Does Obama Even Know How To Negotiate?

Most notably, of course, he said he would take executive action on immigration by year’s end unless Republicans passed a bill. It’s certainly a bold negotiating tactic: You can do what I want, or I’ll go ahead and do what I want anyway. This is how you “negotiate” with a seven-year old, not a Senate Majority Leader.

I’m not sure that isn’t what Obama thinks he’s doing, and I’m sure many of my left-leaning readers are chuckling right now at the comparison. But Mitch McConnell is not a seven year old; he’s an adult, and he just won an election in which voters repudiated Obama and his party. (Temporarily, I am sure, but just the same: As someone once said, “Elections have consequences.”) McConnell is not the proverbial Tea Party extremist who won’t negotiate; he’s an establishment guy, known as a strategist and a tactician, not an ideologue (which is why the Tea Party isn’t that fond of him). In short, he’s someone who can make deals. Responding to McConnell’s rather gracious remarks about finding common goals by announcing that you know what the American public wants, and you’re going to give it to them no matter what their elected representatives say, seems curiously brash. It might chill the atmosphere today when he sits down with congressional leaders.

I wonder if Obama even knows how to negotiate with Republicans. It’s not as if he has a long, distinguished record of passing legislation in a mixed environment.

To be fair, it’s not as if he has a long, distinguished record period.

HOW’S THAT “SMART DIPLOMACY” WORKIN’ OUT FOR YA? (CONT’D): Report: Iran Nuclear Program More Advanced than Previously Believed.

NONSENSE, THE ELECTRONIC MUSIC SCENE RUNS ON VODKA RED BULLS: The Caffeine-Alcohol Effect: Why quaffing energy-drink cocktails may be riskier than sticking to booze alone. But get a bottle of rum and an Eskatrol, and watch the same thing happen to you.

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THE PROBLEM WITH “TEACHING MEN NOT TO RAPE” IS THAT rapists don’t care that it’s wrong.

Hell, we can’t even seem to teach women not to rape.

HARD TO BELIEVE IT’S BEEN 25 YEARS: Austin Bay Remembers The Fall of the Berlin Wall. “The Wall’s cement barriers, barbed wire, anti-vehicle obstacles and anti-personnel mine fields were built to keep East Germans inside East Germany. A few hardline left-wing bien-pensants still preach a U.S.-USSR Cold War equivalency. The Wall’s cold facts reveal them for what they are: liars. No surprise — some of them have become Putin apologists.”

OBAMACARE HEADING BACK TO THE SUPREME COURT:

Justices on Friday agreed to review whether it was illegal for residents of 36 states to receive federal subsidies to help them purchase insurance.

Previous Supreme Court cases focused on the law’s individual mandate, Medicaid expansion, and employer contraception mandate. At issue this time are the subsidies that the federal government provides for individuals purchasing insurance through Obamacare. Though the text of the law says the subsidies were to go to individuals obtaining insurance through an “exchange established by the state,” a rule released by the Internal Revenue Service subsequently instructed that subsidies would also apply to exchanges set up on behalf of states by the federal government.

As detailed previously, a ruling against the Obama administration would have a number of significant ramifications. It would mean millions of Americans receiving insurance in 36 states would be stripped of those subsidies, and on the flip side, that taxpayers could save hundreds of billions of dollars. It would mean the employer mandate wouldn’t apply in those 36 states and the scope of the individual mandate would be narrowed. It would make life a lot more difficult for Republican governors politically and could lead to the re-opening of Obamacare for changes by Congress.

Panels of two federal appeals courts issued contradictory rulings on the whether this rule was legal.

Just so long as Chief Justice Roberts doesn’t chicken out again.

GLAD TO SEE CONGRESS’S DIVERSITY INCREASE: A largely Hispanic Texas district elects Will Hurd, a black GOPer who spent years with the CIA overseas.

SPYING: Peeping into 73,000 unsecured security cameras thanks to default passwords.

JESSICA GROSE: The Midterms Were Only Bad for Women If You Have a Very Narrow View of Women.

SPYING: Harvard Researchers Used Secret Cameras to Study Attendance. Was That Unethical?

PRIORITIES: State Department Official: ‘We’ve Been Working Very Hard’ Against Ebola Travel Ban.

ROSS DOUTHAT: The Wendy Davis Experiment: Notes On An Entirely Foreseeable Debacle.

But even that joke is part of the point: The Christine O’Donnell thing really did happen more or less by accident, because she happened to be in the right place at the right time to catch an anti-establishment wave and win a primary in which she was supposed to be a protest candidate. Whereas the Davis experiment was intentionally designed: She was treated to fawning press coverage, lavished with funding, had the primary field mostly cleared for her, and was touted repeatedly as part of an actual party strategy for competing in a conservative-leaning state. Of course she had a much more impressive resume than O’Donnell, with less witchcraft and real political experience, and in that sense she made a more credible candidate overall. (Though, ahem, O’Donnell actually outperformed Davis at the polls in the end …) But in terms of their signature issues and their public profiles, they were equally absurd fits for the tasks they were assigned; it’s just that in Davis’s case nobody on the left of center wanted to acknowledge it.

She resonated well with East Coast female-journo types. Those women are, in fact, poor proxies for women in general, but neither the media nor the Democratic Party political apparat (but I repeat myself) can afford to acknowledge that.

IT’S OKAY TO REPORT THIS, THE ELECTION IS OVER: U.S. CDC boosts national stockpile of Ebola protective gear.

TOOLS OF THE OLIGARCHS: Matt Ridley exposes how environmentalists take the moral low ground and defend the rich against the poor. It’s always been that way. The modern environmental movement got its start when some rich landowners organized to block the (environmentally friendly) Storm King pumped-storage plant because they were afraid it would hurt their views.

POLITICO: Fire Valerie Jarrett! If Obama really wants to shake things up, his closest adviser should be the first to go. “Jarrett is more than a mere senior staffer to this president, and of course she is not going to be fired outright. Not ever. If her role in this administration reflected reality, Jarrett would be called ‘First Big Sister’ to both Michelle and Barack. . . . For starters, even today, nobody knows precisely what Jarrett does in the White House.”

VIRGINIA HALE: Beyond Parody: How Feminists Are Redefining ‘Hello’ As Sexual Assault.

REPORT: Obama Picks U.S. Attorney in Brooklyn to Replace Holder.

The White House announced this evening that President Obama will formally announce on Saturday his pick to replace Attorney General Eric Holder.

“Tomorrow, the President will announce his intent to nominate U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch to be the Attorney General of the United States,” White House press secretary Josh Earnest said in a statement. “The President will make the announcement in the Roosevelt Room at the White House, and will be joined by Attorney General Holder and Ms. Lynch.”

“Ms. Lynch is a strong, independent prosecutor who has twice led one of the most important U.S. Attorney’s Offices in the country,” Earnest continued. “She will succeed Eric Holder, whose tenure has been marked by historic gains in the areas of criminal justice reform and civil rights enforcement.” . . .

“Ms. Lynch has expanded the office’s leading national security practice into the area of cyber security, and has also made community outreach a priority,” says her Justice Department biography, adding that Holder named her chair of his advisory committee in 2013.

She also sits on the DoJ’s Diversity Council.

Of course she does. Related: McConnell says AG nominee Lynch “will receive fair consideration” & should be considered “in the new Congress.” So not endorsing a lame-duck session confirmation, then.

Related: Confirmation Gauntlet Expected For Loretta Lynch.

Lynch, an African-American woman with a Harvard law degree, has served two stints as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, and has the strong support of Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y.

The move likely will be a disappointment to the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, which pushed hard for Obama to name Labor Secretary Thomas E. Perez, a former head of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.

But Perez would face a major confirmation battle and might only get through the Senate if Democrats jam a pick through in the coming weeks before Republicans take over.

Lynch, who doesn’t have an extensive political résumé, could have an easier time getting through the Senate, especially with Schumer, the No. 2 Senate Democrat, as her sherpa.

Well, stay tuned.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE, LEGAL EDUCATION EDITION: 80 Law Schools Are at Risk of Closure, Mostly in California, Florida, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.

IF IT SAVES JUST ONE LIFE, IT’S WORTH IT: Guy goes to Mexico to kill himself, spends week doing coke and banging hookers, decides to keep living. Plus, the real shocker: “He then packed his shit up and headed back home, STD-free.”

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