Archive for 2017
March 26, 2017
SO PEOPLE WERE ASKING WHY I HAVEN’T POSTED INSTA-WIFE BIKINI PICS FOR BLOG SWEEPS WEEK. But I’ve already done that.
CHANGE: To recognize war heroes, Trump resurrects long-neglected ‘Medal of Honor Day.’ “In commemorating a day for Medal of Honor recipients — which technically falls on Saturday — Trump was resurrecting a holiday designated by Congress in 1990 but only officially observed once.”
GOVERNMENT IS JUST ANOTHER WORD FOR THE THINGS WE CHOOSE TO DO TOGETHER: Inmate Left to Die as Broken Neck Ignored for Days.
QUESTION ASKED AND ANSWERED:
Shot: Can Religious Charities Take the Place of the Welfare State?
—The Atlantic, today.
Chaser: The Tragedy of American Compassion:
What is this book? It’s a history book. It’s a book that describes how Americans successfully fought poverty before the government became involved big time in poverty-fighting during the 1930s and then further in the 1960s. It’s pretty much an unknown history because the assumption, I think, of lots of historians has been that there really wasn’t a whole lot in the way of poverty-fighting until government did become involved. And I spent a year during a previous leave from the University of Texas hanging in the Library of Congress, rummaging through the stacks, finding all these old reports and documents and memoirs and reporters” descriptions about these poverty programs in the 19th century that actually were a lot more effective than many of the programs we have today.
—C-SPAN Booknotes interview with Marvin Olasky, January 22, 1995.
MY USA TODAY COLUMN: Colossal GOP failure and not just on health: Why aren’t bills on infrastructure, tax reform and free speech lined up like planes on a runway? “It’s not like the need to do something about Obamacare was a surprise.”
AUSTRALIA WILL SOON BE WITHIN RANGE OF NORTH KOREAN NUKES: From The Australian:
In South Korea last month, US General Vincent K. Brooks, commander of UN and US forces in the country, stood in front of Foreign Minister Julie Bishop and delivered some sobering news.
The general told her North Korea, led by the maniacal Kim Jong-un, had developed its rocket technology to the point that Australia would soon be within range of a nuclear strike.
“The assessment was that North Korea … was now at a point of advanced technology when it came to ballistic missiles that were capable of carrying a single nuclear warhead, that it was an increasing security risk not only to the Korean peninsula but also to our region, including Australia,” Bishop told The Australian.
US and Australian intelligence had long warned that North Korea was getting close to being able to launch a nuclear-armed intercontinental missile capable of reaching the US or Australia, but no one had spelt out this new reality as bluntly as Brooks.
“It was the first time I had heard it in such stark terms,” Bishop says.
“It is deeply concerning that North Korea has been able to take the opportunity to advance its capability.”
Glory be. We are where we are. North Korea extended the range of its ballistic missiles on Obama’s watch. Now art of the deal meets art of war.
TAXPROF ROUNDUP: The IRS Scandal, Day 1417: Satan, Tea Parties, and the IRS.
Link was wrong before. Fixed now. Sorry! (Bumped).
ROSS DOUTHAT: Break Up The Liberal City. “Yes, for many of their inhabitants, particularly the young and the wealthy, our liberal cities are pleasant places in which to work and play. But if they are diverse in certain ways they are segregated in others, from ‘whiteopias’ like Portland to balkanized cities like D.C. or Chicago. If they are dynamic, they are also so rich — and so rigidly zoned — that the middle class can’t afford to live there and fewer and fewer kids are born inside their gates. If they are fast-growing it’s often a growth intertwined with subsidies and ‘too big to fail’ protection; if they are innovation capitals it’s a form of innovation that generates fewer jobs than past technological advance. If they produce some intellectual ferment they have also cloistered our liberal intelligentsia and actually weakened liberalism politically by concentrating its votes.”
Perhaps another reason to revisit Baker v. Carr.
BLOG SWEEPS WEEK UPDATE: Emily Ratajkowski Wants To Show You How To Take A Swimsuit Selfie.
SO USING YOUR PHONE HELPS BOOST YOUR IMMUNE SYSTEM? iPhones and other every day items that are dirtier than a toilet.
MALAYSIAN POLICE REPORTEDLY ENTER NORTH KOREAN EMBASSY: The investigation of Kim Jong Nam’s assassination continues.
The Malaysian police on Sunday entered the North Korean Embassy in Kuala Lumpur in connection with last month’s murder of Kim Jong Nam, the estranged half-brother of North Korea leader Kim Jong Un, according to a Malaysian Chinese-language newspaper.
Four police officers, including the investigating officer of the murder, the Selangor state police chief and Selangor prosecution team officer, entered the embassy in the morning and were there for two and a half hours, China Press said, adding they were granted permission by the embassy to enter.
The entry indicates that a preliminary agreement may have been reached on processing the body of Kim Jong Nam, and on the recording of statements of three suspected accomplices in the murder believed to be hiding in the embassy, according to the report.
One of the three is Hyon Kwang Song, 44, the second secretary of the embassy.
Stay tuned.
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MIXED NEWS ON STEM CELLS: Stem Cells Show Mixed Results for Impotence After Prostate Surgery. “Danish researchers trying to find a way to help men badly injured by prostate cancer surgery say they got mixed results with an experimental new approach: injecting them with stem cells. Only a few of the men were helped, and those men were able to have sex after the treatment, the researchers told a meeting of urologists. “
FUNDAMENTALLY TRANSFORMED: “There were between 80,000 and 120,000 Jews in Egypt up until the mid-20th century…Today, the Jews of Egypt are estimated to number 18, with 12 of them in the coastal city of Alexandria.”
THE MSM HAS A FEEVAAH, AND THAT MEANS MORE “WHAT ARE THE OBAMAS ARE UP TO THESE DAYS?” STORIES. Michael Walsh: Not Quite Forgotten, Definitely Not Gone.
MY USA TODAY COLUMN: Colossal GOP failure and not just on health: Why aren’t bills on infrastructure, tax reform and free speech lined up like planes on a runway? “It’s not like the need to do something about Obamacare was a surprise.”
SCREENING FOR PROSTATE CANCER VIA MRI. “MRI screening might greatly reduce overdiagnosis and overtreatment of prostate cancer in older men, a preliminary study suggests. Compared to the current screening method, MRI can reduce overdiagnosis of prostate cancer by 50 percent, and unnecessary biopsies by 70 percent in men over 70, Dutch researchers reported Saturday at a conference in England.”
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HOW PAKISTAN PLANS TO FIGHT A NUCLEAR WAR: The article discusses Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal and how it might be used to fight a nuclear war. The article suggests Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal exists to deter India. What if deterrence fails? The article doesn’t address how Pakistan would survive a nuclear war.
Experts believe Pakistan’s nuclear stockpile is steadily growing. In 1998, the stockpile was estimated at five to twenty-five devices, depending on how much enriched uranium each bomb required. Today Pakistan is estimated to have an arsenal of 110 to 130 nuclear bombs. In 2015 the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Stimson Center estimated Pakistan’s bomb-making capability at twenty devices annually, which on top of the existing stockpile meant Pakistan could quickly become the third-largest nuclear power in the world. Other observers, however, believe Pakistan can only develop another forty to fifty warheads in the near future.
Pakistani nuclear weapons are under control of the military’s Strategic Plans Division, and are primarily stored in Punjab Province, far from the northwest frontier and the Taliban. Ten thousand Pakistani troops and intelligence personnel from the SPD guard the weapons. Pakistan claims that the weapons are only armed by the appropriate code at the last moment, preventing a “rogue nuke” scenario.
Pakistani nuclear doctrine appears to be to deter what it considers an economically, politically and militarily stronger India. The nuclear standoff is exacerbated by the traditional animosity between the two countries, the several wars the two countries have fought, and events such as the 2008 terrorist attack on Mumbai, which were directed by Pakistan. Unlike neighboring India and China, Pakistan does not have a “no first use” doctrine, and reserves the right to use nuclear weapons, particularly low-yield tactical nuclear weapons, to offset India’s advantage in conventional forces.
RELATED: See the January 24, 2017 and January 9, 2017 updates in this StrategyPage post.