THAT’S BECAUSE IT IS CENSORSHIP: Milo speech at U-Md. canceled because security fee was too high; supporters call it censorship.

Who do they think they are, DePaul?

A LITTLE PIECE OF POLAND, A LITTLE PIECE OF FRANCE: President Erdogan talks of dominating parts of Iraq and Greece.

In one recent speech, the 62-year-old said Turkey “did not accept the borders of our country voluntarily” and mentioned the National Pact – a plan made at the end of the Ottoman Empire to conquer the Iraqi city of Mosul.

So far the global community has resisted President Erdogan’s desires to be involved in the current military campaign against Islamic State in Mosul, at the request of the Iraqi government.

The Istanbul-born politician lamented: “In 1914 our land covered 2.5 million square kilometres, nine years later it fell to 780,000 square kilometres.”

Mr Erdogan’s fiery comments come as his country stands on the brink of potentially having a major referendum that could see its parliamentary democracy system replaced by an executive presidency, handing the ruling AK Parti boss significantly greater powers than he already has.

Even if Erdogan is speaking only for domestic consumption, that’s worrisome enough.

RESET: Britain, U.S. sending planes, troops to deter Russia in the east.

Germany, Canada and other NATO allies also pledged forces at a defense ministers meeting in Brussels on the same day two Russian warships armed with cruise missiles entered the Baltic Sea between Sweden and Denmark, underscoring East-West tensions.

In Madrid, the foreign ministry said Russia had withdrawn a request to refuel three warships in Spain’s North African enclave of Ceuta after NATO allies said they could be used to target civilians in Syria.

The ships were part of an eight-ship carrier battle group – including Russia’s sole aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov – that is expected to join around 10 other Russian vessels already off the Syrian coast, diplomats said.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said the troop contributions to a new 4,000-strong force in the Baltics and eastern Europe were a measured response to what the alliance believes are some 330,000 Russian troops stationed on Russia’s western flank near Moscow.

Expanding NATO was a mistake. Expanding the alliance’s geographical responsibilities while reducing the alliance’s military capabilities was an even bigger mistake — it fed Russian paranoia about NATO’s intentions and fed Russian contempt for NATO’s strength.

FUNDAMENTAL TRANSFORMATION: Gallup: Support for ban on assault weapons hits all-time low. “What makes this really surprising is that it isn’t a standard partisan effect in which Republican opposition to a ban is outpacing Democratic support for it. All three partisan groups have seen sharp declines in support since 2012.”

I think two things are going on. First, gun control got a boost from the psychological damage and ensuing hysteria after the JFK, RFK, and King assassinations, and that’s worn off, prompting a reversion to traditional American attitudes. Second, it’s become obvious over time that gun control is a dumb political gimmick, mostly designed for virtue-signaling at the expense of flyover rubes.

JOHN STOSSEL ON TODAY’S AMERICA: The ruling class decide which ideas are acceptable, which scientific theories to believe, what speech is permitted.

SO NOW IT’S “PROGRESSIVES” STANDING IN THE SCHOOLHOUSE DOOR: Video: UC-Berkeley Protesters Built a Human Wall to Violently Stop White Students from Crossing Bridge.

To be fair, George Wallace was a Democrat.

HE WILL. RIGHT AFTER PIGS FLY: Senators to Obama: ‘Suspend Our Ties’ with UNESCO After Latest anti-Israel Resolution.

RATS, SHIP ABANDONING: Colbert Mercilessly Mocks Obamacare.

I’M SHOCKED, SHOCKED… NOT: Harvard poll: Majority says ObamaCare faring poorly — even before WH acknowledged steep premium hikes.

BECAUSE THOSE WHO CAN’T BUILD, DESTROY: Why Islamic State wants to destroy the treasures of the ancient world.

SHE’S GOT A TICKET TO RIDE: Hillary Clinton Boards The Climate Crisis Train To Nowhere.

TO ALL THEIR OTHER AMAZING ATTRIBUTES, THESE DESERTS ADD INVISIBILITY: Esquire Panic! Global Warming Creating ‘Vast Deserts’.

IS THAT A GASLIGHT I SEE BEFORE ME? The dangerous lie cop haters tell to neuter our police.

LAW HAPPENS TO OTHER PEOPLE: Bureaucrats Threaten the Rule of Law.

A PLAYWRIGHT WHO COLLABORATED? INCONCEIVABLE: Shakespeare apparently had help with his most famous plays.

SUN TZU SAYS: The best strategy is to attack your enemy’s strategy. The Dems’ strategy is to divide us into ethnic (read: racist) and special interest (read: Goldman Sachs) camps. Instead, Donald Trump calls for a “new deal” for black Americans.

“My deal is grounded in three promises: safe communities, great education, and high-paying jobs,” Trump said, speaking off what appeared to be scripted remarks. “Whether you vote for me or not, I will be your greatest champion. We live in a very divided country and I will be your greatest champion…African-American citizens have sacrificed so much for our nation. They fought and died in every war since the Revolution and from the pews and the picket lines, they’ve lifted up the conscience of our country in the long march for civil rights. Yet too many African-Americans have been left behind.”

OK. “Scripted remarks” is a giveaway we’re dealing with a bigoted reporter. Who’s more scripted than Hillary? But dig the Sun Tzu: Trump’s New Deal is a direct challenge to the crooked Democrats’ evil (hey, it is evil) and racist strategy of division and ritual hate. (Institutionalized hatred is evil — and that’s part of their game.) Challenging this scheme of hate and division is long over due. The Democrats’ strategy has damaged American politics.

HOW BAD HAVE THINGS GOTTEN IN 2016? SO BAD THAT Ted Rall is a voice of sanity. No, really:

WHY ARE MEDIA STILL REFUSING TO USE THIS HOAXER’S NAME, WHEN THEY’VE KNOWN IT ALL ALONG? Rolling Stone Trial: Jackie’s Friends Portray Her as Habitually Dishonest.

DONALD TRUMP’S FEMININE SPEAKING STYLE: “Trump’s use of language is a great mystery. Obviously, some people react very negatively to it, perhaps because they have a prejudice against women and instinctively feel that human beings who are too emotional and relationship-oriented should not be trusted with power.”

Why are Democrats and the media so full of misogyny and hate?

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: My latest New York Observer essay.

WHY ARE DEMOCRATS SO VIOLENT? Homes across street from Sen. Pat Toomey’s residence vandalized with anti-GOP messages.

TRAIN WRECK UPDATE: Harvard poll: Majority says ObamaCare faring poorly — even before WH acknowledged steep premium hikes.

I JUST REALIZED THAT IT’S BEEN OVER TEN YEARS since my 2006 GOP “Pre-Mortem.” What lessons have been learned in the interim?

These comments from Brad Wardell about the 2006 GOP leadership still have some resonance: “You can’t have it both ways. You can’t say that it’s a matter of life and death for the Republicans to maintain control and yet treat the actual job so casually while in office. If the free world hangs in the balance, then bloody act like that during your term and not just in the 60 days before re-election.”

That’s been the problem since 2010, too.

NOT BY MATT YGLESIAS: A look at Future Sex.

SPENGLER: AMERICANS ARE NOT A ‘FOLK’ AND BOB DYLAN IS NOT OUR POET:

What passed for “folk music” in the 1940s and 1950s, by contrast, was the remnant of English ballad preserved in isolated Appalachian communities, as rediscovered by musicologists. Joan Baez made a specialty of such things. John and Alan Lomax gathered Appalachian music, African-American music, and other scraps and shards distant from the American mainstream as an expression of authentic “folk” culture. The entire “folk” movement was Stalinist through and through (including Woody Guthrie, who was a Communist Party hanger-on and probably a member. How do I know this? My late mother was Arlo’s nursery-school teacher in the Red Brooklyn of the 1940s).

Of course, it was all a put-on. Woody Guthrie was a middle-class lawyer’s son. Pete Seeger was the privileged child of classical musicians who decamped to Greenwich Village. The authenticity of the folk movement stank of greasepaint. But a generation of middle-class kids who, like Holden Caulfield, thought their parents “phony” gravitated to the folk movement. In 1957, Seeger was drunk and playing for pittances at Communist Party gatherings; that’s where I first met him, red nose and all. By the early 1960s he was a star again.

To Dylan’s credit, he knew it was a scam, and spent the first part of his career playing with our heads. He could do a credible imitation of the camp-meeting come-to-Jesus song (“When the Ship Comes In”) and meld pseudo-folk imagery with social-protest sensibility (“A Hard Rain is Gonna Fall”). But he knew it was all play with pop culture (“Lone Ranger and Tonto/Riding down the line/Fixin’ everybody’s troubles/Everybody’s ‘cept mine”). When he went electric at the Newport Festival to the hisses of the folk purists, he knew it was another kind of joke.

Read the whole thing.

Earlier: Pete Seeger, America’s Most Successful Communist. Because not just anybody can say they’ve propped up every socialist dictator from Stalin and Hitler to Ho Chi Minh all the way to Saddam Hussein.