AS WELL THEY SHOULD BE: Questions raised on role White House played in UVA rape hoax.

THE SCIENCE IS SETTLED: Study: Beer Creates Jobs. “The Beer Institute and the National Beer Wholesalers Association issued the report Tuesday during a congressional briefing. It claims that beer companies are responsible for 1.5 percent of the gross domestic product and more than $48.5 billion in taxes.” Well, there you have it. You don’t want to be anti-science, do you?

SIX THINGS THAT HAPPENED WHILE THE INTERNET WAS MELTING DOWN OVER A LION.

By the way, any thoughts on whose life the Internet outrage mob will destroy next week?

FLASHBACK: HERBERT HOOVER INCREASED GOVERNMENT SPENDING 67%, MAKING HIM THE FOUNDER OF THE NEW DEAL.

It’s also worth remembering that in 1932, FDR didn’t run on scaling up government even further. Instead, as Jesse Walker of Reason wrote in 2008, Roosevelt “accused Herbert Hoover of ‘reckless and extravagant spending,’ and he further denounced the Republican incumbent for believing ‘we ought to center control of everything in Washington as rapidly as possible.’ Even when he called for interventions in the economy, he generally couched his words in the old liberals’ language of equal treatment rather than the new liberals’ vision of enlightened central planning.”

As Walker noted, the Democratic platform of 1932 “is a remarkable document, considering the way the party’s candidate went on to govern. It isn’t a libertarian manifesto—it endorses several subsidies and regulations—but it hardly embraces the enormous expansion in federal power that FDR would achieve.”

RELATED: Speaking of FDR, “Social Security Isn’t,” Steve Green reminds us Vodkapundit.

SCLEROTIC ONE PERCENTER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE LAUGHS AT THE IDEA OF HER BEING A CHAMPION FOR SMALL BUSINESSES: Which is entirely par for the course, since in April, “Hillary admitted that she was ‘surprised’ to learn that the people who told her small businesses have struggled in recent years were actually correct,” as Joel Gehrke of NRO wrote:

Clinton noted that small business creation has “stalled out,” to her chagrin. “I was very surprised to see that when I began to dig into it,” she said while campaigning in New Hampshire. “Because people were telling me this as I traveled around the country the last two years, but I didn’t know what they were saying and it turns out that we are not producing as many small businesses as we use to.”

The struggles of small businesses during President Obama’s administration are hardly a new subject on the campaign trail. Mitt Romney raised the issue throughout the 2012 presidential election.

And Hillary’s disdain for small business is hardly a new subject. In 1999, the late Tony Snow wrote:

When told [in 1994, that Hillarycare, the prototype for Obamacare] could bankrupt small businesses, Mrs. Clinton sighed, “I can’t be responsible for every undercapitalized small business in America.” When a woman complained that she didn’t want to get shoved into a plan not of her choosing, the first lady lectured, “It’s time to put the common good, the national interest, ahead of individuals.”

Hey, that last sentence sounds even better in the original German: “Gemeinnutz geht vor Eigennutz.”

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE, LEGAL EDUCATION EDITION: About 85 percent of law students at California’s unaccredited schools drop out. Which is smart: “Only 20 percent of those who do graduate manage to pass the state bar.”

HOLDING COLLEGE CENSORS ACCOUNTABLE: George Leef from the Pope Center for Higher Education Policy has an excellent piece in Forbes about FIRE’s recent victory in the Hayden Barnes case and the importance of holding college administrators accountable for violating student and faculty rights. Check out Leef’s article here.

IT’S MORE THAN JUST A SPOT: Ruth Wisse in the Wall Street Journal on “Obama’s Racial Blind Spot” and how the Iran deal will fuel racism toward Jews:

Barack Obama’s election to the presidency represented to many Americans this country’s final triumph over racism. Reversing the record of slavery and institutionalized discrimination, his victory was hailed as a redemptive moment for America and potentially for humankind. How grotesque that the president should now douse that hope by fueling racism on a global scale.

Iranian regime is currently the world’s leading exponent of anti-Jewish racism. . . . Whereas Adolf Hitler and Reinhard Heydrich had to plot the “Final Solution” in secrecy, using euphemisms for their intended annihilation of the Jews of Europe, Iran’s Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei tweets that Israel “has no cure but to be annihilated.” Iran’s leaders, relishing how small Israel is, call it a “one bomb state,” and until the time arrives to deliver that bomb, they sponsor anti-Israel terrorism through Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other militias. . . .

Perhaps Mr. Obama is oblivious to what the scholar Robert Wistrich (who died in May) called “the longest hatred” because it has been so much a part of his world as he moved through life. Muslim Indonesia, where he lived from age 6 to 10, trails only Pakistan and Iran in its hostility to Jews. An animus against Jews and Israel was a hallmark of the Rev.Jeremiah Wright’s church in Chicago that Mr. Obama attended for two decades. And before he ran for office, Mr. Obama carried the standard of the international left that invented the stigma of Zionism-as-imperialism. As a presidential candidate, Mr. Obama felt obliged to repudiate his pastor (who had famously cursed America from the pulpit), and muted his far-left credentials. Mr. Obama was voted into office by an electorate enamored of the idea that he would oppose all forms of racism. He has not met that expectation.

Some Jewish critics of Mr. Obama may be tempted to put his derelictions in a line of neglect by other presidents, but there is a difference. Thus one may argue that President Roosevelt should have bombed the approach routes to Auschwitz or allowed the Jewish-refugee ship St. Louis to dock in the U.S. during World War II, but those were at worst sins of omission. In sharpest contrast, President Obama’s nuclear agreement with Iran is an act of commission. This is the first time the U.S. will have deliberately entered into a pact with a country committed to annihilating another people—a pact that doesn’t even require formal repudiation of the country’s genocidal aims.

Exactly. Why most American Jews are standing silently by, like sheeple, in the face of these facts is a utter mystery to me. Why did American Jews not demand, at a minimum, Iran’s repudiation of its genocidal aims against Israel? Admittedly, such a repudiation would not have changed the hearts and minds of the Iranians, but it would have at least forced the Administration to publicly recognize and discuss Iran’s genocidal intentions.

As it stands, however, the genocidal aims of Iran toward Israel have been swept under the rug, not even worthy of discussion, which is exactly what the Obama Administration wanted. The Administration’s failure to even discuss the inhumanity of Iran’s racist/ethnic hatred is both shameful and telling, particularly given that Obama is our first black president whose entire presidency has focused incessantly on issues of race and ethnicity. The Obama Administration’s indifference to Iran’s hatred of Jews will further fan the flames such hatred across the globe.

The only explanation I can fathom for American Jews’ acquiescence to the Iran deal is that most are liberals/progressives first, Jews second. How tragic that this attitude has emerged only one generation removed from the Holocaust.

IF YOU STRIKE ME DOWN… Ex–Top Gear Trio Will Make a Car Show for Amazon Prime:

Alongside fellow ex–Top Gear hosts James May and Richard Hammond, the irascible [Jeremy Clarkson, formerly of the BBC’s Top Gear series, aka “The Anti-Scold”]  has signed on to host a new automotive series on Amazon Prime, which will start streaming sometime next year. It’s a savvy move, contractually: The non-compete clause in the trio’s old BBC contract apparently only forbade them from signing with a competing British channel for two years, and said absolutely nothing about working with the content-producing arm of an American logistics company.

I wonder if any BBC subscribers will weigh what they’re getting for their mandatory license fees versus what’s included for voluntarily signing up with Amazon Prime or Netflix?

TAXPROF ROUNDUP: The IRS Scandal, Day 813.

IT’S THE DETERRENCE, STUPID: Iran: The President says this is the best deal available. He’s right; it’s the best deal he could get—absent a credible threat to use force.

If military capacity were all that mattered, Iran would never have dared to build the full-scale uranium enrichment capacity that it now possesses. Intentions matter as well, however, and here the Iranian leaders have calculated—correctly—that the American government would not use its military trump card to halt Iran’s progress toward nuclear weapons. As President, Barack Obama repeatedly asserted that, where that program was concerned “all options”—including, by inference, the use of force—were on the table, but the mullahs rightly surmised that this was a bluff and, by continuing to build the enrichment program that Obama had vowed not to tolerate, they called it. This is the sense in which the Obama Administration’s description of the deal as the best one available is correct. Given that it was negotiating from a position of self-imposed weakness, it is difficult to see how it could have obtained more favorable terms than the ones embedded in the July 14 agreement. . . .

All of this is to say that, at this very late date, keeping Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, with all the catastrophic consequences that that would have, depends on a credible threat to use American military force. This is true even in the highly unlikely event that the process of inspections works as the Obama Administration claims it will. For if and when inspections in these circumstances detect violations, or the Iranian regime simply decides to withdraw from the agreement, as its thirty-sixth paragraph permits, what will the United States do? Nuclear nonproliferation in the Middle East ultimately depends, that is, not on the details of the Vienna agreement but on the familiar Cold-War policy of deterrence.

Even under Bush, it seemed as if the Iranians had more leverage than was visible. I can speculate on where that leverage came from, but that’s all it would be.

WHAT’S DRIVING THE OUTRAGE OVER CECIL THE LION? “It seems clear that Palmer has become a symbol of [fill in the blank] privilege. As such, he must be destroyed in protest of such privilege. Something tells me we wouldn’t be talking about this story but for the fact that it involves a man of Palmer’s status. It’s about him and the class of people he represents, not the lion,” Walter Hudson writes.

Spot on. And for the celebrities who doxxed him, it’s about guilt for having obtained an even higher level of wealth and privilege.

RELATED: Cecil the Lion and the Cultural Perils of Internet Outrage.

WHEN YOUR “CRISIS COMMUNICATIONS” FIRM DOESN’T WANT TO BE ASSOCIATED WITH YOU. . . . Public Relations Firm SKDKnickerbocker Scrubs Website Of Tie To Planned Parenthood.

JACKIE CALMES HAS A PIECE FOR HARVARD’S SHORENSTEIN CENTER ARGUING THAT CONSERVATIVE MEDIA DRAG THE REPUBLICAN PARTY TO THE RIGHT. This may be true, but it’s dwarfed by the extent to which the rest of media drag the entire nation to the left. As Prof. Tim Groseclose noted in his Left Turn: How Liberal Media Bias Distorts the American Mind, without media bias America as a whole would have the politics of Texas or Tennessee. That’s why I keep telling GOP donors that they need to occupy the media space — not just the conservative media space — to win. Otherwise it’s like fighting a battle without air superiority.

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PUNCHING BACK TWICE AS HARD: “James Woods is suing a Twitter troll for $10 million after the Ray Donovan star was called a ‘cocaine addict’ by the user @AbeList. List has since deleted his Twitter account. According to the suit, Woods wants $10 million because he feels like he was defamed by the troll. Here’s what you need to know.”

I wonder if the celebrities such as Mia Farrow and Continuum’s Rachel Nichols and the numerous others who doxxed Walter Palmer should start lawyering up as well? Should Twitter itself?

DON’T WORRY, I’M SURE EVERYTHING’S FINE: IAEA Refuses to Brief Senators on Iran Deal, Even in Classified Setting.

IRS SCANDAL UPDATE: Lerner emails show IRS tried to cover up targeting of conservative groups.

WAPO DISCOVERS THAT there are libertarians on both sides of the abortion debate. Though, naturally, most oppose government funding.

UPDATE: Well, most.

DUE PROCESS FOR COLLEGE STUDENTS IS BAD, DUE PROCESS FOR FEDERAL EMPLOYEES IS ESSENTIAL: Obama Threatens to Veto VA Accountability Act: Says the bill would violate VA employees’ due process rights.

President Obama threatened to veto the Veterans Affairs Accountability Act in a statement on Wednesday.

The President called the bill “counterproductive” and said it would create “a disparity in the treatment of one group of career civil servants.” President Obama’s statement also said the bill would “have a significant impact on VA’s ability to retain and recruit qualified professionals and may result in a loss of qualified and capable staff to other government agencies or the private sector.”

“These provisions remove important rights, protections, and incentives which are available to the vast majority of federal employees in other agencies across the government and are essential to ensure that federal employees are afforded due process,” the statement said.

The bill would expand the VA’s ability to fire incompetent or corrupt employees. It is a follow-up to the 2014 Veterans Access, Choice, and Accountability Act, which extended that ability to top executives at the agency. The new bill would go beyond just executives to lower level employees.

Public servants, or public masters?

IN LOUISIANA, THE WORD OF OFFICER CLAY HIGGINS IS LAW: “By tomorrow, a hundred thousand people will have watched you commit a felony. You WILL be recognized. And the people that know you don’t really like ya, anyway. So when it comes down to a choice between you and a thousand dollars — they’ll take the cash.”

By the way, I love the Internet; I’m watching Officer Higgins’ Crime Stoppers report on a Weblog in Australia where the second blog comment is from someone named “Tex Lovera,” who writes, “That is one Louisianan that is welcome in Texas anytime!”

So say we all! (Y’all.)

ANY LAWYERS OUT THERE WHO COULD help Mandy Nagy?

DOES IT CAUSE BRAIN DAMAGE? BECAUSE THAT WOULD EXPLAIN A LOT: Congressional Couches Test Positive for Toxic Retardant.

As Congress considers an overhaul of toxic chemical regulations, a new analysis has brought the issue close to home — perhaps a little too close for comfort.

The Environmental Defense Fund recently analyzed six couches from each of the congressional office buildings and found three contained a toxic flame-retardant chemical known as TDCPP. The chemical can be found on the California Environmental Protection Agency’s list of carcinogens.

The analysis could cause some concern around the Capitol — particularly among members of the “Couch Caucus,” who sleep in their offices. Advocates working to overhaul chemical safety regulations hope it pushes lawmakers to act.

“It’s crazy to think that there are toxic chemicals in the very furniture we’re sitting on while working to update America’s chemical safety law,” Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., said in a statement. A couch from his office in the Hart Senate Office Building tested positive for TDCPP, along with couches from the Rayburn and Cannon House Office Buildings.

The EDF-secured nickel-sized samples of foam from the couch cushions of six individual offices. The samples were then sent to Duke University’s Superfund Research Center, which conducts free analyses of furniture foam, and three of the six samples tested positive for TDCPP.

The couches in the study are a small sample size for the hundreds of offices on Capitol Hill. But the EDF noted in a statement about the analysis that congressional furniture “remains in use for many years” and “the varying results may be due to differing ages of the furniture.”

TDCPP, also known as chlorinated tris, was used in children’s pajamas in the 1970s, but manufacturers stopped using the chemical when consumers became concerned about its harmful effects.

I mean, there must be some explanation.

HERBERT CROLY COORDINATE! HERBERT CROLY COORDINATE! Video: Chris Matthews stumps talking point-obsessed DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz: “Tell Me The Difference Between You And A Socialist.”