CHARLIE MARTIN: Daesh (ISIS) Claims Attacks in Tehran. “This could be the start of something big.”

NEWS YOU CAN USE: How To Design And Build Your Own Robot.

BUT WHY ON EARTH DID THEY CARRY THEM IN THE FIRST PLACE? Following Backlash, Sears Removes Anti-Semitic T-Shirts.

I’M EXPECTING AN EARTH-SHATTERING KABOOM: Iraqi Kurds plan independence referendum on Sept. 25.

AUSSIE PUNDIT ANDREW BOLT 1, ANTIFA Ø: “Let this be a lesson to all the cowardly ‘antifa’ morons who put on masks and attack people in public: It might not go the way you planned.”

NEW CIVILITY WATCH: Trump Derangement Syndrome Spirals Out of Control with Sick Performance of Trumpian Julius Caesar: “This version of Shakespeare’s tragedy features a Caesar who bears a striking resemblance to President Donald Trump, complete with his trademark orange hair, business suit, and long red (or blue) necktie. True to the original play, the rash populist Caesar ends up being assassinated on the Senate floor by a group of conspirators — including his friends Cassius and Brutus — saving the Republic from his dangerous reign.”

To be fair though, no bulls-eye clip art was used in the play, so it’s all good.

HINT: IT’S A SEARCH. Supreme Court To Consider Fourth Amendment Implications Of Cell Site Location Info.

THE CARRIERS AT MIDWAY: Historical sketches of the U.S. and Japanese flattops that fought it out in 1942.

DISTANTLY RELATED: A snapshot of the carrier U.S.S. Midway –taken from a distance of 600 kilometers. The ship is now a museum, permanently docked in San Diego.

ANDREW MCCARTHY: Comey’s Notes and the Wages of the Special Counsel Investigation.

Here is another example of how this could play out at Thursday’s hearing. When the president fired Comey, he took pains to say that the former director had told him on three separate occasions that he was not under investigation. Prehearing reporting suggests that Comey does not remember it this way. The matter is thus being teed up as though one or the other man must be lying.

We’ll have to see what happens, but to my mind, the seeming contradiction maybe reconcilable. According to Comey’s own prior testimony, the Russia investigation is a counterintelligence investigation. As I have repeatedly pointed out, a counterintelligence investigation is very different from a criminal investigation. It does not have “subjects” and “targets,” which are terms-of-art in criminal investigations, designating suspects who may be indicted by the grand jury. The purpose of the counterintelligence investigation is to focus on a foreign power – in this instance Russia – in order to determine what threats it might pose to American interests.

It is not the purpose of a counterintelligence investigation to build a prosecutable criminal case against a suspect. Nevertheless, if evidence of criminal wrongdoing turns up, the FBI’s national security division reserves the right to refer that evidence to its criminal division and the Justice Department, which can then determine whether prosecution is warranted.

It could well be that President Trump, a non-lawyer, was told the Russia investigation is a counterintelligence investigation, which would not be designed to build a case against him or anyone else. If so, he might understandably have taken that to mean he is not a suspect under investigation. At the same time, Comey realizes that you never know what evidence an investigation will turn up until it has been completed. Since the Russia investigation had not been completed, the former director may well believe that could not, and did not, make commitments regarding any information that had not yet been uncovered.

That’s just my educated speculation – and, as noted above, we’ll have to see what happens.

Lots to chew on here — read the whole thing.

THANKS, BILL! How Bill Clinton Brought Back the 1911 Pistol.

But did it ever really go away?

HMM: OPEC’s ace in the hole.

As it turns out the Saudis have a plan which they believe will help push the oil markets in what they consider the proper direction. It is common knowledge that OPEC has openly been encouraging other oil producing nations to join in the production cut and according to Saudi Arabia those calls have been answered.

In a recent press conference in Riyadh the Saudis disclosed they had enticed not just the elephant (Russia) in the oil market in the production cut, they have also induced several other smaller non-OPEC players to join their side.

While Saudi Arabia has not yet disclosed the identity of their additional recruits the list of candidates is relatively limited. An appeal to curb production would only appeal to nations which are net oil exporters and therefore would benefit from a rise in the price of crude. The list of nations who fit into this category is limited and for now speculation is rampant.

Assuming nobody cheats, what happens when the cuts expire and American frackers have had an additional nine months of OPEC price supports and domestic productivity increases?

STILL DOING WELL ON AMAZON: Kurt Schlichter’s Indian Country.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: What’s The Best Way To Lose Five Pounds Fast? If you follow this approach, it’ll mostly be water.

THE BEST DEFENSE IS NO DEFENSE: South Korea Suspends Deployment of U.S. Antimissile System.

In comments to reporters, a senior official from the presidential Blue House in Seoul said on Wednesday that the two launchers of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system that had been installed could remain but that four launchers that had yet to be deployed would not be set up until the administration completed an environmental assessment.

The missile defense system, known as Thaad, has been controversial in South Korea and has drawn sharp criticism from China, which views the system’s radar as a threat. Beijing has taken retaliatory economic measures against Seoul, including curtailing the flow of Chinese tourists and punishing South Korean companies in China.

During his campaign, Mr. Moon, who won the presidency last month, complained that the United States and the previous South Korean administration rushed to deploy Thaad before the election to present him with a fait accompli. His decision to suspend the installation could strain relations with the White House, which has taken a hard line in confronting North Korea and its nuclear weapons program. It could also raise concerns about United States efforts to present a tough, unified position with Japan and South Korea against the North.

This time appeasement will work.

NEW BREAKTHROUGHS IN CONSTITUTIONAL THEORY: Blocking People On Twitter Is A First Amendment Violation, But Only When Trump Does It.

To be fair, it seems that a lot of things are unconstitutional, but only when Trump does them.

IT MEANS SHE DOESN’T HAVE THE COURAGE TO ELIMINATE SAFE SPACES FOR TERRORISTS IN THE REAL WORLD: Theresa May Wants to End “Safe Spaces” for Terrorists on the Internet. What Does That Even Mean? Because raiding extremist mosques — and the British government knows which ones they are — would be an admission of what’s really happening.

I DON’T KNOW, I CAN IMAGINE QUITE A BIT: London Attack Reveals That ‘Known Wolf’ Terrorism Is Worse Than You Could Imagine.

WHAT’S WORSE THAN HAVING TO PUT UP WITH “THE MALE GAZE?” NOT HAVING TO PUT UP WITH THE MALE GAZE: What I’d give for a wolf-whistle now I’m 50: SARAH VINE says that if she had her time again she would accept the gesture for what it is. “Now, aged 50, I realise how silly I was to get so wound up about such things. If I had my time again, I would accept those gestures for what they are: crude but flattering demonstrations of male admiration. And I would appreciate them all the more as I know how much I miss them now they’re gone.”

NO. Is Trump Violating the First Amendment by Blocking People on Twitter?

PUNCH BACK TWICE AS HARD: Protesters get more than they bargain for when Andrew Bolt bashes back.

CONTROVERSIAL columnist and TV personality Andrew Bolt has “clobbered” a group of masked protesters who set upon him in Melbourne yesterday.

On his TV program last night, Bolt explained how he was about to launch a book on US President Donald Trump at a restaurant in Carlton, in the city’s inner north, when a woman asked to take a selfie with him.

Before they could take the photo, two masked protesters set upon Bolt, spraying his face and suit with what he described as “sticky liquid with glitter and dye”.

The protesters may have got more than they bargained for because Bolt quickly retaliated, punching one of the attackers repeatedly.

“Bad luck for them, of course; I don’t do running and hiding,” he told his viewers on his Sky News program The Bolt Report on Tuesday night.

The conservative columnist screened security camera footage of the altercation on his show, freezing on the faces of each of his attackers as well as a third man who filmed the ambush.

“Police are now looking for this young man, who will have a big bruise on the left side of his face and another bruise between his legs, for which I apologise, I guess, but I don’t really fight nice if I’m pushed too far.”

Good for him. Lefty violence exists mostly because violent lefties are used to operating with impunity. Don’t let them do that.

THERE GOES THE NARRATIVE: DNI Director Dan Coats: “I Have Never Been Pressured,” Nor Have I “Felt Pressure To Intervene.”

Plus: Admiral Mike Rogers: I Was Never Asked To Do Anything “Immoral, Unethical, Or Inappropriate.”

RETAIL BLUES: Sears store closures for 2017 now pushing 250.

I’d be surprised if by the end of next year there were any Sears stores still operating.

THE PENTAGON’S PERSONNEL PROBLEM.

EXCELLENT: USDOJ ends settlement slush fund practice of funneling winnings to private groups. But we need a statute making this illegal or the Dems will just start it up again whenever they’re back in power.

WE MAY NEVER KNOW THEIR TRUE MOTIVE: Schools ‘in lockdown’ after female nursery worker on her way to work is pulled to the ground and slashed in the arm by three girls ‘shouting Allah will get you’

Karrien Stevens, who runs Little Diamonds nursery in Hermon Hill, London said a member of staff was punched, kicked and slashed by three girls while on her way to work this morning.

The victim, 30, was walking down Wanstead High Street, in north London, when she was set upon and knifed, according to her boss.

She was attacked from behind and then stabbed in the arm as her assailants chanted ‘Allah’, however police are not treating it as a terrorist incident.

That’s correct — they’ve graduated to insurgency.