TAXPROF ROUNDUP: The IRS Scandal, day 1319.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: In Title IX Industry, Chaos and Confusion.

Every constituency and interest group involved with the increasingly complex and expensive process of campus sexual assault adjudication—administrators, consultants, victim advocates, due process hawks, and defense attorneys—is waiting with bated breath to see how the incoming administration will navigate the explosive terrain of Title IX enforcement. Inside Higher Education highlights the uncertainty swirling around the industry as to whether the administration will reverse the Obama administration’s aggressive measures reducing due process for students accused of sexual assault—and if so, what kind of effect that will have on the ground. . . .

There is no way to know exactly what actions the administration will take in this area, especially because a new head of the Office for Civil Rights in Education (the agency responsible for promulgating Title IX regulations) has yet to be appointed. It seems reasonable to expect that some of the Obama-era guidance will be rolled back, although an administration run by someone who has made comments that would likely be enough to convict him in a campus proceeding might be cognizant of the political optics of acting too aggressively in this area.

Then there is the possibility that no matter what action the Trump administration takes or doesn’t take on Title IX, near-universal anti-Trump horror on college campuses will make the climate more favorable to sexual assault activists. Much of academia has sworn to resist the Trump administration; this might entail a further leftward lurch on key culture war questions. Then again, if schools go too far in reducing due process, it’s not inconceivable that an enterprising right-leaning (or civil libertarian) head of OCR could take campuses to task for violating Title IX by discriminating against male students.

As with much else about the incoming Trump administration, the unsettled area of campus sexual misconduct law is highlighting the perils of government-by-executive-regulation (something that the New Yorker’s Jeannie Suk has discussed with respect to the transgender bathroom issue). To avoid further creative partisan rule-making on such an important and charged question, Congress would be well-advised to pass real legislation clarifying what Title IX actually requires, the mandate of various agencies charged with enforcing it, and its relationship to federal funding in higher education.

You could do this by regulation, but yeah. On the other hand, when you see the huge edifice of “interpretation” and “guidance” that the bureaucracy has managed to build based on Title IX’s single sentence providing that “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance,” you have to wonder.

For more on how that happened, everyone who’s interested should read Robert Shibley’s Twisting Title IX.

THE CREW OF THE EDMUND FITZGERALD KNEW THIS: This Is What A Great Lake Looks Like After All The Vacationers Are Gone: “This can’t be a lake, it’s got to be an ocean.” Some very cool photos.

UPDATE: Monster waves, up to 27 feet, forecast for Great Lakes.

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MY USA TODAY COLUMN: To mark the anniversary of Zaevion Dobson’s death, I interviewed his mother. “Zaevion was a protector. He was the protector of my home, of his brother. [When the shooting happened] Zaevion had a chance to run, but he didn’t. He jumped on top of the girls.”

VICTORY TOURS, COMPARE AND CONTRAST:

INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY: It’s Official: Clinton’s Popular Vote Win Came Entirely From California.

Democrats who are having trouble getting out of the first stage of grief — denial — aren’t being helped by the fact that, now that all the votes are counted, Hillary Clinton’s lead in the popular vote has topped 2.8 million, giving her a 48% share of the vote compared with Trumps 46%.

To those unschooled in how the United States selects presidents, this seems totally unfair. But look more closely at the numbers and you see that Clinton’s advantage all but disappears.

As we noted in this space earlier, while Clinton’s overall margin looks large and impressive, it is due to Clinton’s huge margin of victory in one state — California — where she got a whopping 4.3 million more votes than Trump.

California is the only state, in fact, where Clinton’s margin of victory was bigger than President Obama’s in 2012 — 61.5% vs. Obama’s 60%.

But California is the exception that proves the true genius of the Electoral College — which was designed to prevent regional candidates from dominating national elections.

In recent years, California has been turning into what amounts to a one-party state. Between 2008 and 2016, the number of Californian’s who registered as Democrats climbed by 1.1 million, while the number of registered Republicans dropped by almost 400,000.

What’s more, many Republicans in the state had nobody to vote for in November.

There were two Democrats — and zero Republicans — running to replace Sen. Barbara Boxer. There were no Republicans on the ballot for House seats in nine of California’s congressional districts.

At the state level, six districts had no Republicans running for the state senate, and 16 districts had no Republicans running for state assembly seats.

Plus, since Republicans knew Clinton was going to win the state — and its entire 55 electoral votes — casting a ballot for Trump was virtually meaningless, since no matter what her margin of victory, Clinton was getting all 55 votes.

I think California needs to be divided into several states. For fairness.

HEH: Russian Hackers May Have Interfered With Vote On Church Potluck, Local Man Suspects.

PERSONALLY, I’M AMAZED AT THE SPEED WITH WHICH DISSENT HAS BECOME PATRIOTIC AGAIN: “As a journalist of my acquaintance joked on Twitter this week, I’m so old that I remember when it was dangerous and unpatriotic to question the validity of election results.”

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT A FEW DAYS AGO: Help this Marine, and win cool stuff.  What cool stuff?  This cool stuff:

LIBERALS, DRINKING THEIR OWN INK: Climate Alarmists Are Frantically Copying Scientific Data, Fearing Trump ‘Book Burning’.  (this after reading another article today on how feminists are stocking up on contraceptives to share, as if Trump were going to ban them, has me seriously concerned for mental health of the left side of this nation.)

WHAT IS A LETHAL DOSE OF SCHADENFREUDE, AND IS THE NEW YORK TIMES TRYING TO KILL US? The NYT Is Having a Meltdown Over Trump’s Israel Nominee.

WHY ARE DEMOCRAT-MONOPOLY CITIES SUCH CESSPITS OF RACIAL VIOLENCE? Man Punches a Homeless Guy in a Los Angeles Subway…Reportedly over a racial disagreement.

Los Angeles’ last Republican mayor left office 15 years ago.

THE PERSISTENT PROBLEM OF MARXISM: University Offering Course on ‘The Problem of Whiteness’.

I BET HE HAS ALT-RIGHTISTS UNDER HIS BED, TOO: The Alt-Rightists at the FBI.

LIBERAL PRIVILEGE: Being Liberal Means Never Having To Say You’re Sorry.

DING-DONG: Feel Good Story of the Day, Courtesy of the New York Times.

WHY ARE LEFTY COMMUNITIES SUCH CESSPITS OF VIOLENCE AND BIGOTRY? Portland Woman Quits Job After She Says a Trump Piñata Was Lynched At a Holiday Party: “Standing in that crowd was one of the most terrifying moments of my life,” she writes.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: All the way down the slippery slope at Cal State Northridge.

WHAT DESPERATION SOUNDS LIKE: “The electoral college is enshrined in the Constitution, but that doesn’t necessarily make it constitutional.”

IF EVERYONE IS PREDIABETIC, WHAT DOES IT MEAN? “The study found that more than 80 percent of Americans over age 60 would get the same warning. So would nearly 60 percent of those over age 40, an estimated 73.3 million people.”

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IN THE MATTER OF GALACTIC EMPIRE V. SOLO: Han Solo Must Hang.