THE DEMOCRATS lost the war for staying power:

By 2014, I was hearing a lot of claims that the Republican Party was on its way out: “a regional rump party, confined to the South” was the popular line for a couple of years. Sure, they might win some midterm elections here and there, but they were demographically doomed at the presidential level. This became such conventional wisdom that when I confessed I thought Republicans were likely to retake the White House in 2016, people stared as though I had said my columns were dictated to me by the ghost of Walter Winchell.

The midterm elections of 2014 did not necessarily shake this conventional wisdom. But two recent pieces of news ought to. Tea Party favorite Matt Bevin just won an upset election in the Kentucky governor’s race. Not only did he take back a seat that Democrats have controlled for 40 of the last 44 years, but also, he won by a smashing margin, 53 percent to 44 percent. This after polls had shown his Democratic opponent, state attorney general Jack Conway, in a narrow lead and the New York Times was speculating that Bevin might “eke out” a victory by driving conservative Christians to turn out.

Meanwhile, the latest Quinnipiac poll shows Clinton losing to every major Republican primary contender except Trump. Even if you believe the more favorable polls, a Democratic strategist probably does not want to see them so close — not when Clinton is a widely known name with the nomination practically sewed up, while most Americans probably know Rubio as “Marco Who?”

Whatever your opinion on the merits of Barack Obama as a president, his tenure has been rough for his party.

The GOP’s biggest asset here is that most Dems are still unwaware of this.

HOW THE SIXTH CIRCUIT stood up to hecklers (and cops). “It’s a very good decision for free speech advocates. The majority went out of its way to lay out the relevant First Amendment issues in a clear manner and address them, and wound up vigorously supporting the right to say things that crowds hate, and the obligation of police to protect unpopular speech rather than yield to a heckler’s veto.”

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GIZMODO REPORTER’S ATTEMPT TO SMEAR TED CRUZ’S GUN USE GOES EMBARRASSINGLY AWRY: “In this particular tale of media hit job turned embarrassment, we have what might be one of the best public displays of gun ignorance presented as fact I’ve ever seen. The only things missing are a barrel shroud and a couple rounds of rubber bullets.” Click over to Legal Insurrection to see the photo that Gizmodo used to claim Cruz was “violating the first two rules of gun safety.”

OBAMA’S WAR ADVISORS TURN ON HIM:

The picture being painted by Obama’s soon-to-be-former advisors is one of a president paralyzed with indecision. He is being increasingly tested by the world’s bad actors and revisionist powers and has little resolve to act early and decisively. That is an impression that was confirmed by Reuters in October. They reported that the president was similarly incapacitated by the People’s Republic of China’s brazen decision to create new islands that would function as naval and air bases in the middle of the contested Spratly Islands late last year.

* * * * * * *

As the fruits of Barack Obama’s feckless approach to foreign affairs ripen, and the conflicts that he sought to resolve only deteriorate, the president’s advisors are increasingly training their fire on him. In the final year of this administration, that trend is only likely to intensify. If the Obama era is going to be remembered as the period when the seeds of chaos and conflict were sown, surely more creatures of Washington are going to emerge to make sure that they do not take the blame for sowing them. A president who has so perfected the art of throwing others under the bus is about to get the same treatment.

Oh, the tell-all books that will soon emerge from the strangest presidency in American history.

TEACH WOMEN NOT TO LIE ABOUT RAPE! (CONT’D): Another high-profile rape accusation falls apart.

Chicago Blackhawks ice hockey star Patrick Kane will not face criminal charges over a rape accusation made against him earlier this year.

Prosecutors in the case cited “significant material inconsistencies” between what the accuser said and what other witnesses said.

“The totality of the credible evidence — the proof — does not sufficiently substantiate the complainant’s allegation that she was raped by Patrick Kane and this so-called ‘case’ is rife with reasonable doubt,” District Attorney Frank Sedita III said in a statement on Thursday.

The district attorney won’t even convene a grand jury to hear the evidence collected during a three-month investigation. Part of the reason the case will not go to the grand jury is that DNA evidence contradicted the woman’s allegation.

The woman claimed she was raped by Kane in his home this past summer, and while Kane’s DNA was found on the woman’s shoulders and in her fingernails, it was not found on her underwear or genitals. There was, however, DNA from other men found.

Sheesh.

THE BIG FIX: Roger Simon asks, Who’s Paying CNN to Elect Ben Carson President?

Perhaps it’s time for Moses Wine to come out of retirement to blow the lid off the case!

Related: “CNN outs Ben Carson as nice kid,”  Paul Mirengoff writes at Power Line: “Did CNN fact-check Dreams From My Father when Obama was running for president? If so, I must have missed it.” The Big Fix was definitely in at CNN that year.

“THIS ISN’T HYPERBOLE: THE POLICY REALLY IS THAT BAD:” Law Students Wrote This Unconstitutional, Ungrammatical Speech Code: University of Missouri School of Law students told to self-censor on social media.

Pathetic.

AP: JERRY BROWN USED STATE OFFICIALS TO RESEARCH OIL ACCESS ON FAMILY PROPERTY: “California is at the beginning of a $100 billion project to run a medium-speed electrical train along and over the the San Andreas Fault in large part to give travelers an option to get from LA to Frisco without feeling guilty about global warming. Airplanes, which make the trip more quickly and with far less government subsidies, use fossil fuels — and Governor Jerry Brown and the state of California don’t like fossil fuels. That is, they don’t like them unless Jerry Brown can find some under his family’s property … and the Associated Press reports that Brown used state resources to do some prospecting on the ol’ homestead,” Ed Morrissey writes.

As Moe Lane adds at Red State, “Moving along from that for a moment: the real problem here is not actually whether state regulatory officials decided to go ahead with buttering up their boss by giving him a thick report that said Nope, you got no oil there** and a pretty map to put on a wall somewhere. They did. These things happen. No, the problem here is that Jerry Brown is one of those politicians who likes to pretend that he operates on a higher moral plane than the rest of us, and that he’s not like other politicians, and any number of other silly lies.  That’s why his office was so insistent that they didn’t do anything wrong.”

SHOCKINGLY, NO: Do Ammunition Background Check Laws Reduce Murder Rates?

CAMILLE PAGLIA: ‘Transgender Mania’ is a symptom of cultural collapse, and parents who indulge young children in this are committing child abuse. (Video)

PROMISE MEETS EXPIRATION DATE: 15 Times Obama Said He Would Not Put American Boots on the Ground in Syria:

Earlier: 36 times Obama promised “If you like your plan, you can keep your plan:”

Related: A Long Post: The [Previously!] Complete List of Obama Statement Expiration Dates.

LIVE FROM THE GAZA STRIP, IT’S SHARIA NIGHT! Video: “That awkward moment when you’re praising the mother of terrorist who stabbed Israelis and she pulls a knife on live TV.”

FORWARD, COMRADES! End “Sexual Apartheid” In Sports! “Men and women play different sports, play in different leagues, and play by different rules – rules generally devised by men at a time when women had no rights or voice. I’d need a thesis to set out all of the examples of gender discrimination in sport.”

BURN IT ALL TO THE GROUND. ALL OF IT. PURIFY PENNSYLVANIA WITH FIRE, DISGRACED PA AG KATHLEEN KANE! Porn scandal: Top prosecutor keeps releasing raunchy emails.

NOBEL PEACE PRIZE UPDATE: Medics were shot from the air as they ran between buildings during U.S. strike on hospital in Kunduz, CNN claims.

IT’S COME TO THIS: No, Spooning Isn’t Sexist. The Internet Is Just Broken.

Pretty much every article declaring something sexist is a waste of pixels.

HAPPY LOVE YOUR LAWYER DAY.

LIKE SOMETHING IN A FANTASY NOVEL: Singapore is building an entire forest in a high-rise apartment atrium.

WE’RE NUMBER FIVE! Study Ranks I-70 5th Worst Highway In U.S.  Yeah, I know.  Not of national importance.  Probably.  But considering how many ours of my life have been spent in traffic jams on I-70 I needed to share.  I didn’t imagine it.  That road sucks.

BUT THAT’S THE BEAUTY OF CAPITALISM: The real reason for Facebook’s pedophile ban.

IT’S ALRIGHT. THE INTERNATIONAL MEDIA CAN IGNORE THIS TOO: Truth-telling cameras — Palestinians’ new foe.

DO NOT RESUSCITATE: Your ♡bamaCare!!! Fail of the Day.

COATTAILS ARE OUT THIS SEASON: The 2015 election tightened the Republican stranglehold on state government.