GOOD ADVICE: Don’t Lose Friendships Over Politics.

MY USA TODAY COLUMN: ‘Crooked Hillary’ nickname isn’t going away: The new FBI information suggests Clinton is either criminal, criminally incompetent or both.

THAT’S AWFUL. CHEAPER FOOD WILL MEAN LESS STARVATION, WHICH IS BAD FOR GAIA! In the middle of the “hottest year ever” come record wheat harvests.

SETH BARRETT TILLMAN: Trump, Confirmation Bias, and the Rule of Law.

MISTER, WE COULD USE AN AD MAN LIKE DON DRAPER AGAIN. James Lileks on modern advertising:

Here’s your Male Archetype 2016: big hole in his ear, inked arm, curated beard, ineffably self-satisfied, involved in artisanal jams but yet bacon-aware because he’s a Man, and concerned with sustainability because he wears only thrifted tees.

We’re supposed to admire him but not really. He’s a cliche, a laughable sort — but not really. Women are supposed to be impressed that he can get out a stain, and they’ll say they wish more men could just . . . take care of themselves, you know? But tbh they’re sorta messy themselves and can’t do much in the way of domestic stuff either. It would be nice if a guy knew how to do that stuff. Some of it. Not all of it. And not if he, like, has lots of ideas about domestic stuff, and is always saying you’re doing it wrong when you try to make a sandwich or lectures you for using Conflict Olive Oil. IT’S SO COMPLICATED

If you thought the “Man stupid, woman wise” cliché on TV was getting old, you have no idea just how long it’s been around. Read the whole thing.

ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS NOBODY IS ASKING: Why ‘Warcraft 2’ May Never Play in US Theaters:

Legendary Entertainment’s fantasy epic based on the “World of Warcraft” video game series starred American actors such as Paula Patton and Ben Foster. But the movie’s dominant international box office — it made $220.8 million in China and set a record for the biggest disparity between domestic and foreign receipts — means that “Warcraft 2” might draw its talent elsewhere. And given “Warcraft’s” weak performance at home, it may not even play in American theaters at all.

“Who says it needs to have American actors?” Sky Moore, a partner at Stroock & Stroock & Lavan who’s worked on several U.S.-China co-production deals, told TheWrap. “I would suspect that the sequel would be more China-centric. It’s very possible it wouldn’t be released here.”

Back in the old days, Hollywood moguls reminded their directors to make movies “that will play in Peoria.” These days, they’re far more interested in films that play in the People’s Republic of China.  If you’ve ever wondered why the current crop of American summer movie product sucks like a Hoover, this article explains why – for Hollywood, based in a more or less American state called California, the rest of America simply isn’t its core audience anymore. “And as China’s box office continues to grow — despite a summer slump this year, it could pass the U.S. as the world’s largest as soon as 2017 — Moore said that could lead to sequels of movies that connected a lot more with Chinese than American audiences being produced for that market.”

So much for Peoria.

THE 21st CENTURY ISN’T TURNING OUT AS I’D HOPED: LGBT Activists HATE the Feminist #IfMenHadPeriods Hashtag.

GHOSTING — THE IRISH GOODBYE:

Ghosting—aka the Irish goodbye, the French exit, and any number of other vaguely ethnophobic terms—refers to leaving a social gathering without saying your farewells. One moment you’re at the bar, or the house party, or the Sunday morning wedding brunch. The next moment you’re gone. In the manner of a ghost. “Where’d he go?” your friends might wonder. But—and this is key—they probably won’t even notice that you’ve left.

Yes, I know. You’re going to tell me it’s rude to leave without saying goodbye. This moral judgment is implicit in the culturally derogatory nicknames ghosting has been burdened with over the centuries. The English have been calling it French leave since 1751, while the French have been referring to filer à l’anglaise since at least the late 1800s. As with other cross-Channel insults—depending on your side, a condom is either a French letter or la capote anglaise, syphilis the French disease or la maladie anglaise—the idea is to pin unsavory behavior on your foes.

Here in the U.S., the most-used term seems to be Irish goodbye, which, due to unfortunate historical stereotyping, hints that the vanished person was too tipsy to manage a proper denouement. Dutch leave is a less common, but apparently real, variant. (I picture someone taking a couple pulls on a vaporizer, scarfing too much bitterballen, and stumbling into the night.) And then there’s the old, presumably Jewish joke: WASPs leave and don’t say goodbye, Jews say goodbye and don’t leave.

But religio-nationalist slurs aside, is it really so bad to bounce without fanfare?

My dad recommended to me the technique of quietly slipping out of late night parties when I was a teenager, so I have no qualms over dubbing it “the Irish Goodbye.” Of course, these days, I’d probably just blame my actions on a roaring “introvert hangover…”

TAXPROF ROUNDUP: The IRS Scandal, Day 1216.

IT’S PROBABLY NOTHING: ‘More will come’ ISIS warns HUNDREDS of jihadis have SNUCK into Schengen to attack Europe.

VOTER FRAUDSKI: More circumstantial evidence suggests Russian-backed actors targeted state election boards.

WELLS FARGO APOLOGIZES FOR AD WHICH SUGGESTS THAT ACTORS AND DANCERS SHOULD GIVE UP THE ARTS AND BECOME ENGINEERS:

Wells Fargo has been forced to apologize after infuriating the arts community by suggesting they should take up more serious careers.

The company released an ad campaign last week, which said that the ballerinas and actors of yesterday could be the botanists and engineers of today.

But the glossy ads, showing young people smiling while holding technical equipment, have angered both professional and aspiring artists.

Who took to social media en masse to attack the ad, resulting in newspaper articles and blog posts (err, like this one) discussing it, resulting in much more exposure than an ad campaign alone would have generated. Very well played, Wells Fargo.

THANKS, FRACKERS! Oil Slips Toward $47 as Hopes for Producer Action Fade.

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and non-OPEC producers such as Russia will hold informal talks in Algeria on Sept. 26-28. Others in the market are skeptical a deal will happen.

“The two nations’ cooperation is understandable,” said Kaname Gokon, a strategist with Okato Shoji Co Ltd.

“But when oil output is reduced, other producers would receive the benefit. There is still a question whether they can cut production for a sustainable period.”

Iran, which is raising exports after the lifting of Western sanctions in January, refused to participate in the earlier effort to freeze output. Saudi Arabia insisted all producers take part, prompting the collapse of the talks.

There’s really nothing quite so satisfying as watching Iran, Russia, and Saudi Arabia fight over a shrinking pie.

LOSING THE PHILIPPINES ON OBAMA’S WATCH: Richard Fernandez: The Dragon Comes With A Suitcase. If Obama were deliberately trying to wreck the U.S.’s world position, what would he do differently?

A LOOK AT THE GULEN SCHOOLS IN TURKEY: This opinion essay (written by a Radio Free Europe program director) describes how the Gulen movement became a very powerful social and political force in Turkey. The story of a young Kurdish girl who attended a Gulen school in Ankara 20 years ago is the narrative frame. Her parents were initially impressed by the private school’s self-proclaimed educational excellence. Its low cost sealed the deal. Then, as their daughter’s behavior changed, they became suspicious of the Gulen movement’s intentions. Her mother feared she was “being brainwashed.” So they withdrew her. Something was not quite right with Hoca Efendi’s (Gulen’s nickname) rigid socialization system…

Read the essay to find out what wasn’t quite right. Also, note her father emphasized a historical fact that the July coup has obscured:

… But what makes me angry is that Erdogan and Gulen were the right and left hands of the same body until 2013, supporting each other. Now one [Erdogan] is fighting a war against the other [Gulen], laying all the blame in the world on his former ally.”

As long as Gulen helped Erdogan, “not quite right” was OK.

MOVEMENT BUILT ON A LIE, BUSTED FOR A LIE: Dallas Observer: Black Lives Matter Protest Leader Dominique Alexander Claims He’s Targeted, But He Just Ran Out of Chances.

INSANITY CONSISTS OF . . . Government’s Obamacare Failures Spur Calls for More Government Meddling.

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MY USA TODAY COLUMN: ‘Crooked Hillary’ nickname isn’t going away: The new FBI information suggests Clinton is either criminal, criminally incompetent or both.

THE CIVIL SERVICE HAS BECOME A FESTERING ONE-PARTY POLITICAL MACHINE. THE SPOILS SYSTEM WOULD AT LEAST PROVIDE ACCOUNTABILITY: Even Worse Than Clinton’s Emails: The civil service was missing in action. We learned about the emails from a hacker.

VIDEO: HILLARY CLINTON COUGHING ATTACK IN CLEVELAND.

“What is with Hillary’s health?”

KARMA COMES SWIFTLY FOR WOULD-BE TRUMP SIGN THIEF (VIDEO):

Considering that 12 years ago, you could get a T-shirt with an etched out Bush/Cheney logo and the phrase “A person of tolerance and diversity keyed my car,” it’s good to see someone pushing back against leftwing property damage and theft at election time, a quite physical manifestation of their eternal desire to squelch free speech and dissenting opinions.

SCENES FROM RAHM EMANUEL’S CHICAGO: 31 shot, 9 fatally, over 21 hour period Monday into Tuesday.

Good lord.

THE ULTIMATE OUTSIDER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE ROLLS OUT EXPENSIVE NEW TELEVISION AD BLITZ:

My campaign is rolling out a major ad-blitz & starting tomorrow you won’t be able to turn on a TV w/o seeing this pic.twitter.com/qPyWxvCrkk

— Sweet Meteor O’Death (@smod2016) September 5, 2016

Very good, dramatic ad. Excellent tone. This could easily be a November landslide for SMOD. Literally so.