SEEN ON FACEBOOK: “I seem to recall that a lot of Clinton supporters a month ago were worrying that the loser in the election would contest the results and undermine confidence in the US election system. I have to admit… they were right.”
Archive for 2016
November 27, 2016
WELL, THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY, YOU KNOW: Helping Brain Cancer Patients Survive Longer by Sending Electric Fields Through Their Heads.
Optune’s tumor-treating fields (TTFs) offer an entirely new type of treatment. Unlike chemo, this electrical treatment doesn’t cause collateral damage in other parts of the body. Yet many oncologists remain skeptical of the technology. “The adoption rate has not been stellar to date,” admits Eilon Kirson, Novocure’s chief science officer.
Last Friday’s announcement could change things. At a neuro-oncology conference, researchers reported the results of Optune’s big clinical trial, which looked at survival rates among 695 patients with glioblastoma. Two years after beginning treatment, 43 percent of patients who used Optune were still alive, compared to 30 percent of patients on the standard treatment regimen. Four years out, the survival rates were 17 percent for Optune patients and 10 percent for the others. “To patients, that’s a big difference,” Kirson says. “That’s worth fighting for.”
I remember reading John Gunther’s Death Be Not Proud, where he remarks that any brain cancer with the prefix “glio” is bad news. Sadly, over 50 years later, that’s still true. But this is something.
NEWS YOU CAN USE: 6 Reasons Why ‘Starship Troopers’ Is the New ‘The Art of War.’
WHY ARE DEMOCRAT-MONOPOLY CITIES SUCH CESSPITS OF VIOLENCE AND DEPRAVITY? New Orleans violence ‘out of control’ says mayor after one person is killed and nine are injured in shooting on Bourbon Street in city’s famous French Quarter.
New Orleans’ last – and only! – Republican mayor left office in 1868.
IN THE MAIL: You Are a Badass: How to Stop Doubting Your Greatness and Start Living an Awesome Life.
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TAXPROF ROUNDUP: The IRS Scandal, Day 1298.
IT DOES SEEM TO HAVE WORKED OUT THAT WAY: Trump Win Gives Holiday Shoppers Green Light to Spend.
JOHN C. CALHOUN SMILES:
On the same day last week that Donald Trump nominated noted immigration hawk Sen. Jeff Sessions for Attorney General, New York City declared that it would stick to its “sanctuary city” policy—setting up a battle that will likely occupy a lot of national attention during the next Administration. . . .
This is a political fight both sides will relish taking on. Trump got a big boost early in his campaign by shining a spotlight on the murder of Kate Steinle by an illegal immigrant in San Francisco. The murderer had previously been detained by the San Francisco police, but under SF’s sanctuary city policy—which is more militant than New York’s—the city refused to honor a request from the federal government to transfer him, and instead released him. This was a story to which Trump returned throughout his campaign.
Furthermore, as I wrote on Friday, the nomination of Sen. Sessions as AG likely signals that the Trump Administration will seek first and foremost to fulfill his campaign promise of a more hawkish line on immigration through the enforcement of existing laws against criminal illegal aliens. Unlike previous Attorneys General, Sessions will presumably not hesitate to use the full range of remedies, including financial and legal sanctions, available to the federal government to compel cooperation from reluctant municipalities. And it helps Trump’s populist brand to pick fights with New York City liberals who want to protect illegal immigrants in disregard of the law.
For their part, de Blasio and other leaders of deep-blue cities also have strong incentives not to back down. Again, this will partly be a matter of politics: fighting Trump plays as well with de Blasio’s constituents in NYC as fighting de Blasio does with Trump’s backers in the heartlands. But there are other considerations. Right now the NYC policy is not to call the feds about a suspect’s immigration status until the the person is convicted, while federal policy technically requires the local cops to call the feds as soon as they find out someone is here illegally. Cities with large illegal immigrant policies, like New York, feel that such a policy will deter its residents from cooperating with the police or calling emergency services.
Such a fight will galvanize public opinion on each side. The Jacksonians will see only flagrant disregard for law and order; for historical reasons, many in the south will also be angered by what they’ll perceive as deeply hypocritical flouting of federal authority. . . .
But the law will not be on de Blasio’s side. And it is a deep principle of American history that the state and local authorities not be allowed to override or nullify federal law. This is a point that liberals reaffirmed with particular vehemence on the immigration front as recently as a few years ago, when arguing (successfully) that Arizona’s immigration laws were preempted by federal policy.
As we’ve been writing around here, Donald Trump is the most purely Jacksonian character to win the White House since possibly Andrew Jackson himself. And now he may have a nullification crisis on his hands. I can’t imagine Bill de Blasio ever dreamed he would wind up as the heir to John C. Calhoun—but he just might.
Technically, states’ refusal to cooperate with a federal regulatory scheme isn’t the same as nullification, and it’s not even illegal unless it violates a condition on federal funding. But these niceties aren’t likely to get much attention.
NORMALIZING DICTATORSHIP: Obama’s statement on Fidel is so anodyne that it sanitizes his atrocities and terrible place in history.
MY USA TODAY COLUMN: Castro, Chavez, and “Bad Luck:” Castro and his ilk showed us that under socialism, the powerful grow rich — and everyone else grows poor.
Both Venezuela and Cuba have suffered under leaders who enriched themselves and their families. Chavez’s daughter is the richest person in Venezuela, with a net worth in the billions, while in true “socialist equality” fashion, Cuba is now run by Castro’s brother, Raul.
Yet their poverty and oppression are treated as if they’re just “bad luck.” But it’s only bad luck in the Heinlein sense. As Heinlein also said, a good cook can take wholesome ingredients and produce something much more valuable. A bad cook, on the other hand, can take those same ingredients — valuable in themselves — and produce an inedible mess.
Socialist kleptocrats are like Heinlein’s bad cook, with the added trait of stealing any edible leftovers for themselves and their kin. Perhaps the world will learn a valuable lesson from the fates of Cuba and Venezuela, and avoid such “bad luck” in the future.
Well, we can hope.
“WHAT A PACK OF SORE LOSERS:” Kellyanne Conway Blasts Clinton Campaign For Joining Recount. Punch back twice as hard: Demand recounts in states Hillary carried. Wear them out and make them spread money and lawyers across as many states as possible, instead of focusing on the ones they can rig.
YOU NEED A MULTI-PART SERIES FOR THIS: Fidel Castro’s greatest atrocities and crimes – Part 1.
Related: The Monster Is Dead.
THE NEW REPUBLIC: The Liberal Response to Trump Is Devolving Into Outrage Porn.
PAUL MIRENGOFF: Dems’ smear campaign against Sessions likely to backfire.