MICHAEL WALSH: At German Ballot Box, Islamophile Merkel Gets Head Handed to Her.

ISWYDT.

FCC COMMISSIONER: Colleges Endangering Free Speech.

Ajit Pai, the son of immigrants from India, grew up in Parsons, a city of 10,000 in rural Kansas, before going to Harvard University and the University of Chicago for law school. His parents came to the United States with “about $10 in their pockets, a willingness to work very hard, and a belief in the American Dream.” . . .

It seems to me that something is changing in American society, and particularly on college campuses. There’s the old saying that I may not agree with what you say, but I’ll fight to the death for your right to say it. That kind of ethos is increasingly rare.

That poses a special danger to a country that cherishes First Amendment speech, freedom of expression, even freedom of association. I think it’s dangerous, frankly, that we don’t see more often people espousing the First Amendment view that we should have a robust marketplace of ideas where everybody should be willing and able to participate.

Largely what we’re seeing, especially on college campuses, is that if my view is in the majority and I don’t agree with your view, then I have the right to shout you down, disrupt your events, or otherwise suppress your ability to get your voice heard.

That’s something, I think, that poses a danger to what I call the culture of the First Amendment. The text of the First Amendment is enshrined in our Constitution, but there are certain cultural values that undergird the amendment that are critical for its protections to have actual meaning. If that culture starts to wither away, then so too will the freedom that it supports.

Well, when President Trump starts going after anti-Americans, suddenly academia will re-appreciate the virtues of free speech. And that’s why the President should probably always be a white male Republican — because that’s what it takes to make the rest of the establishment appreciate the Bill of Rights.

ROGER SIMON: SENIOR ADVISER SAYS TRUMP’S MUSLIM POLICY ‘ESSENCE OF MODERATION.’ “Regarding the Muslims, [Trump advisor Stephen Miller] pointed out that there were many historical precedents for an immigration pause. (Again, he did not specify, but I will take his word for it.) He said that calling a temporary halt to Muslim immigration is actually the ‘essence of moderation.’ In the light of San Bernardino and Paris, perhaps it is,” Roger writes.

KA’PLAH! Paramount Claims Crowdfunded ‘Star Trek’ Film Infringes Copyright to Klingon Language.

ZIKA: Zika infects lab brain cells, strengthens link to microcephaly.

SPENGLER: The 30% solution — when war without end ends. “Nations do not fight to the death, but they frequently fight until their pool of prospective fighters has reached a point of practical exhaustion. In most cases, this involves reaching the 30% mark where casualties are concerned. Wars of this character demarcate many turning points in world history.”

This reminds me of Josh Marshall’s 2003 worries that we hadn’t killed enough Iraqis to ensure a stable outcome there, which in retrospect seem better-founded than I thought at the time. Sorry, Josh, I should’ve taken that more seriously.

KURT SCHLICHTER: Random Thoughts On The Current Chaos. “A lot of my pals are #NeverTrump. Their arguments are sound, and don’t look to me to argue that they should vote for a Dem-donating, vulgar liar with Consistency Deficit Disorder other than to say I will if he’s the nominee because he’s better than the evil Democrats. But this Nazi-slur crap has to stop. If you really think a substantial portion of the conservative-leaning segment of the American people are active fascists, then you may as well give up now. And I refuse to get the sads when a dude in a John Deere cap who probably got shot at in Fallujah smacks some commie creep who crashes a Trump rally to set fire to Old Glory.”

Question: If Trump is Hitler, what does that say about the bigshots of the Democratic and Republican parties — and all the media people — who have been palling around with him for decades?

SCOTT ADAMS: The Media Are Trying To Get Donald Trump Killed:

Back in 1997 I made a prediction in my book The Dilbert Future that seems to be coming true. It stated:

In the future, the media will kill famous people to generate news that people will care about. – The Dilbert Future (May 1997)

Three months later, the media chased Princess Di into a tunnel and created a dangerous situation that killed her but was terrific for television news ratings. The media didn’t plot to kill anyone, but they created a situation that made it likely someone important would die because of the way their business model works. That was the basis for my prediction.

Fast-forward to today and we see the media priming the public to try to kill Trump, or at least create some photogenic mayhem at a public event. Again, no one is sitting in a room plotting Trump’s death, but – let’s be honest – at least half of the media believes Trump is the next Hitler, and a Hitler assassination would be morally justified. Also great for ratings. The media would not be charged with any crime for triggering some nut to act. There would be no smoking gun. No guilt. No repercussions. Just better ratings and bonuses all around. . . .

I could go on, but you see how easy this is. The mainstream media can either portray Trump as Hitler or non-Hitler. So far, they have chosen (subconsciously I assume) the Hitler analogy all the way.

Sadly plausible.

ROGER SIMON: Marco Rubio’s Last Rites?

I’M NOT SO SURE: SAS ‘not as tough as they used to be:’ Historian says today’s special forces unit are “not as hard” as their predecessors due to their comparatively pampered upbringings.

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POOR MITT:

ME: “I would bet $500 that Trump is going to win Ohio.”

MEADE: “Oh, yeah. Especially now that Mitt Romney is there campaigning for Kasich.”

It’s been a bad election cycle for just about everybody who’s gotten involved.

TEST DRIVE: Tesla Model X P90D. “While it took some getting used to as I got in and out of the X all day, the amount of work the vehicle does to greet you when you walk up holding the key fob is astonishing. If you approach from the front, the driver-side door will crack open a few inches and then swing all the way out as you walk past. If you approach from the rear, it’ll just pop all the way open. Once you sit down and step on the brake, the door closes automatically. There’s no on/off switch anywhere, so depressing the brake pedal will get the car ready to go as it seals the cabin. The X automates these everyday things to a degree that you feel like other cars just aren’t as invested in your well-being as you get ready to go somewhere.”

RIP KEN ADAM, DR. STRANGELOVE, JAMES BOND PRODUCTION DESIGNER.

Adam was 95; among the many films in his career, he designed the legendary War Room set and the B-52 interior for Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove, and most of the giant underground or in-volcano lairs for Blofeld and other Bond super-villains bent on world-domination during the ‘60s and ‘70s. Adam won a pair of Academy Awards; the first for his design on Kubrick’s much underrated 1975 historical epic, Barry Lyndon, and later for the 1995 film, The Madness of King George.

UPDATE:

“I was in the States giving a lecture to the Directors Guild when Steven Spielberg came up to me,” Mr. Adam told the BBC. “He said, ‘Ken, that war room set for “Strangelove” is the best set you ever designed.’ Five minutes later he came back and said, ‘No, it’s the best set that’s ever been designed.’”

—From the New York Times’ obit, headlined, “Ken Adam, Who Dreamed Up the Lairs of Movie Villains, Dies at 95.”

AS LONG AS HE CAN: Kirsten Powers: How long will President Obama stay silent on Christian genocide?

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NANOTECHNOLOGY UPDATE: Tightly-fitted DNA parts form dynamic nanomachine.

WELL, BARRY AND HILLARY CERTAINLY DO PLAY ROUGH WITH VIDEO MAKERS THEY DON’T LIKE. D’Souza: Hillary Film Could Earn Me ‘Life in Prison.’

THEY HAVE DEEP POCKETS: Expelled basketball captain Jack Montague to sue Yale.

IT’S COME TO THIS: High School Censors Swastikas, Missing Entire Point of Satirical Anti-Nazi Play, The Producers.

CREEPY: Microsoft automatically upgrading Windows 7 & 8 users to Windows 10.

This is all part of Microsoft’s plan, of course. Last October, the company announced that it would reclassify Windows 10 as a “Recommended” update from older versions starting in early 2016, at which point many more users would get the upgrade without explicit permission. That reclassification began on February 1, and auto-upgrades have been rolling out ever since. If complaints are reaching a higher volume now, perhaps it’s because the rollout is getting more aggressive.

Here’s what the Recommended update looks like, according to ZDNet’s Mary Jo Foley: First, users will receive a notification saying their PCs are scheduled to receive Windows 10 in the next three or four days. Users can click a small link to cancel or postpone the update, but simply closing the window will cause the notification to appear again one hour before the scheduled update time. If users don’t cancel or postpone within that timeframe, the update will begin automatically.

Most of us (me included) are in the habit of dismissing those dialog boxes without really reading them, but I don’t recall anything so major as an operating system upgrade being covered by one.

FRONTIERS IN ENCRYPTION: Go ahead, make some free, end-to-end encrypted video calls on Wire.

NEXTGEN CROWDFUNDING PRESENTS IGNITION 1.0: A LIVE-STREAM EVENT FROM #SXSW. We always love new and creative uses of the Internet. But crowdfunded IPOs? They do exist. This event at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas (my soon-to-be-backyard) will be showcasing five soon-to-be-going-public companies. The event will be streamed live starting at 1:30 PM PDT from L.A. and then 2:00 PM PDT from Austin. More info about crowdfunded IPOs can be found here.

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FUNDAMENTALLY TRANSFORMED: Latest Survey Finds 25% of French Teenagers Are Muslims.

Related: Au revoir and shalom: Jews leave France in record numbers.