NEWS FROM THE CULTURE WARS, AGAIN: Mulan vs. the Diversity-Mongers.

SO I’M GOING TO BE POSTING SOME BOOK LINKS HERE: I haven’t read the books, unless say specify I have and enjoyed them.  However most of the writers are self-confessed libertarians and conservatives. This puts them at a disadvantage in the industry.  So… Call me the equalizer.

FROM NITAY ARBEL: On Different Strings: A musical romance.

NO JOKE, RED BILLY? NYC mayor on blast: We believe this was an intentional act. (video)

NO COMMENT: New York explosion leaves dozens injured.

YOU THINK? An Obamaite admits the nuke deal may feed Iran’s aggression.

MODIFIED LIMITED HANGOUTS DIDN’T WORK SO WELL FOR NIXON: The Clintons’ damage-control efforts raise new questions on Hillary’s health.

21st CENTURY HEADLINES: A Sex Toy Lawsuit Highlights Privacy Concerns Around ‘Smart’ Dildos.

(Via Maggie’s Farm; photo atop article of said smart dildo may be semi-NSFW if someone is watching over your shoulder.)

FASTER, PLEASE: Jeff Bezos on nuclear reactors in space, the lack of bacon on Mars and humanity’s destiny in the solar system.

Mars needs bacon!

IT’S COME TO THIS: Utah – Hispanic Activist Who Criticized Trump’s Mexican Rapist Comments Arrested for Raping Illegal Immigrant…

Or as some have said: “What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.”

LOOKS LIKE AN IED, WHICH IS SUSPICIOUS AFTER WHAT HAPPENED IN NEW JERSEY A BIT EARLIER: Explosion Rocks New York’s Chelsea Neighborhood.

An explosion rocked New York’s Chelsea neighborhood Saturday night.

The explosion came just after 8:30 pm when a dumpster blew up outside a 14-story residence for the blind, the New York Post reported. At least 15 people suffered minor injuries, police told the paper.

Tweets from the area describe “one loud long boom.” . . .

Earlier in the day a pipe bomb exploded in Seaside Park, New Jersey near a Marine charity run. The device was placed in a garbage can.

Hmm.

WHEN YOU LOOK PREGNANT, but are not. That’s probably a sign you need to diet.

YOU KNOW, THIS IS PRETTY MUCH AN EVERGREEN HEADLINE: Why Vox’s Matt Yglesias Should Go Back in Time and Unwrite Recent Column.

AN ADVANCE IN MISSILE AND AIR DEFENSE: The Navy has used an F-35 to provide targeting information to a SM-6 missile (Standard Missile-6). The SM-6 intercepted a sub-sonic target. The F-35 served as an airborne sensor.

AT AMAZON, save on Surveillance Cameras.

Plus, deals in Arts, Crafts & Sewing.

HANS BADER: Obama Backs the Worst Colleges While Destroying For-Profit Schools.

The federal government happily subsidizes inferior state colleges that graduate few if any of their students. That includes Chicago State University, which has a 12.8 percent six-year graduation rate.

The Obama administration has rewritten federal student loan rules in a way that encourages colleges to raise tuition and effectively subsidizes the worst colleges the most. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York found that each additional dollar in government financial aid results in a tuition hike of about 65 cents.

The federal government also subsidizes expensive, low-quality third-tier law schools whose graduates are often unemployed. It does so even though many of their graduates will never pay back their student loans because of their low graduating salaries, and the huge amount of money law students are allowed to borrow from the government. . . . As the Cato Institute’s Neal McCluskey notes, ITT Tech produced better graduating salaries for its students than nearby public alternatives. But no one is suggesting that those lousy public colleges be shut down.

Like most such things, it’s just a transfer of taxpayer resources to Democratic Party constituencies.

Related: “You’d think that there’s no inherent reason why universities should always and only ever be non-profit (or state owned). After all, we don’t demand that our cars be made by non-profit groups, and say that there’s no way a for-profit car manufacturer could ever be trusted to provide us with a quality product.”

LAWSUIT: Who did the FBI pay to get into the San Bernardino attacker’s iPhone?

YUK: Scientists discover 3 new strains of norovirus that are causing gastro outbreaks.

I THINK WE SHOULD BE ELIMINATING FEDERAL DEPARTMENTS, NOT ADDING THEM: Dear U.S. Presidential Candidates, Here’s Why the Country Needs a Secretary of Travel.

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WHAT EVERYONE NEEDS: An Anti-Drone Rifle.

THERE’S AN ANTHONY WEINER JOKE IN HERE SOMEWHERE: “Hairy” Nanorods Offer Simpler Production Process.

SOMEBODY SHOULD ACCIDENTALLY DELETE THEIR PAYCHECKS FOR THAT MONTH: Police IT staff checked wrong box, deleted 25% of body cam footage: In 2014, Oakland Police Dept. made fateful error, hadn’t set up backups, either.

MOVE ALONG CITIZENS, NOTHING TO SEE HERE: Meat cleaver madman, a Palestinian, was in Midtown to appeal deportation order before he sliced cop, the New York Daily News reports:

The meat cleaver maniac who hacked an off-duty cop is a Palestinian busted two months ago while screaming in Arabic outside a Brooklyn synagogue.

Suspect Akram Joudeh was only in New York for Thursday’s Midtown rampage because he was appealing a deportation notice — with a hearing set for Oct. 14, a high-ranking NYPD source told the Daily News.

Warning — cognitive dissonance ahead!

Cops found two knives inside Joudeh’s car after answering the July report of an erratic man on Shore Parkway in Brooklyn shout “Allahu Akbar!” — or “God is great” in Arabic.

But the source said investigations by the NYPD and FBI showed Joudeh, 32, was emotionally disturbed and not a terrorist threat.

Especially not in an election year. (See also: Minor Libyan unpleasantness on September 11, 2012.)

Exit question:

I’VE BEEN WRITING ABOUT PHAGE THERAPY FOR A LONG TIME: Your Next Antibiotic Might Be A Virus. “The FDA’s strict rules about drug safety make it virtually impossible to approve the personalized phage cocktails used in Georgia, which is why AmpliPhi is testing blends for common bacteria. But because bacteriophages are already everywhere (there are roughly 10 million in a drop of ocean water), the FDA’s less stringent food-additive arm has already approved phages for food producers to spray on meat. The sprays, which are organic, kill more than 99 percent of the nasty bugs they touch. The post-antibiotic age may be coming, but we’re not out of weapons yet.”

Maybe the FDA needs to revamp its approval process for phages.

IT’S SCAMS, SLEAZE AND RIPOFFS ALL THE WAY DOWN: Report: Clinton campaign may have overcharged donors.

An elderly woman who donated to the Hillary Clinton campaign says she was charged multiple times after she stipulated she would only be making a one-time donation, according to a report from the New York Observer.*

Carol Mahre, an 81-year-old grandmother from Minnesota who has voted Democratic since Eisenhower’s re-election in 1956, said she wanted to make a one-time donation of $25 to Clinton’s campaign. But when she received her U.S. Bank statement, she noticed that multiple charges of $25 (and one for $19) were made to her account from the Clinton campaign.

Mahre said she wanted to make only a one-time donation. Her son, Roger, agreed to help her get her money back, as she could not afford the multiple donations.

“It took me at least 40 to 50 phone calls to the campaign office before I finally got ahold of someone,” Roger told NBC affiliate Kare11, which first investigated Mahre’s story. “After I got a campaign worker on the phone, she said they would stop making the charges.”

But the charges didn’t stop. Roger said his mother is “very good with the Internet,” and doesn’t believe she would have mistakenly signed up for recurring donations. But even if she had, why would the recurring donations change from $25 to $19? Why would the charges come on the same day or in the same month instead of monthly? . . .

Observer reporter Liz Crokin spoke to a Wells Fargo employee who works in the fraud department to figure out what was going on.

“We get up to a hundred calls a day from Hillary’s low-income supporters complaining about multiple unauthorized charges,” the employee, who asked to remain anonymous, told Crokin. The source added that they had not received any calls about the Trump campaign and donations.

The source said this has been going on since the spring, and that the campaign stops after it has taken a little less than $100 from a one-time donor.

“We don’t investigate fraudulent charges unless they are over $100,” the source said. “The Clinton campaign knows this, that’s why we don’t see any charges over the $100 amount, they’ll stop the charges just below $100. We’ll see her campaign overcharge donors by $20, $40 or $60 but never more than $100.”

Disgraceful. I’m sure the FBI will be right on this. . . .