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GREEKS DEMAND END TO AUSTERITY: Well, austerity can end when Greece pays its debts.

Thousands of Greeks walked off their jobs on Wednesday and marched through central Athens in an angry protest against continued austerity measures being demanded by international lenders in exchange for disbursing bailout funds.

There were isolated clashes with police, but the demonstration was generally peaceful.

The strike was called by the country’s main public and private sector unions a day before Greece’s parliament is due to vote on reforms that would help unlock the funds from the 86-billion-euro bailout, the country’s third in seven years.

New austerity attached to the funds release include the 13th cut in pensions since 2010 and a reduction in tax-free allowances on income. They come after years of cuts that for a time threw the country into deep recession.

Unemployment is running at close to one in four and there is a 48 percent jobless rates among the youth.

The phrase “public sector unions” keeps cropping up in these disasters.

RELATED: Old but relevant.

BREAKING: Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina collapses during DC race, gets CPR, taken away in ambulance.

Reportedly he was still breathing when taken away.

THE RUSSIAN HACK: It sounds like a Hillary conspiracy theory, and it is.

R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr:

How did we find ourselves at this comic pass with the Democratic Party warning us of the Russian menace — the Democratic Party whose members have included Alger Hiss and, more lately, Bill Ayers? Well, turn to the recently released bestseller written by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes, “Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton’s Doomed Campaign.” All the pundits are talking about it, and there are things to admire in it. For instance, turn to Page 395. There you will find this revelation: “Hillary declined to take responsibility for her own loss . Hillary kept pointing her finger at Comey and Russia . That strategy had been set within twenty-four hours of her concession speech . For a couple of hours [Hillary and her aides] went over the script they would pitch to the press and the public. Already, Russian hacking was the centerpiece of the argument.” Now it is the “centerpiece” of the mainstream media and the Democratic Party’s campaign against Donald Trump.

Read the whole thing.

I’d just add that if Democrats had constantly shown this much concern about the Russians, we’d have won the Cold War ten years sooner.

THE PARTY LINE SURE CHANGES FAST: BREAKING: Heroic U.S. Media Now Totally Trust Putin.

FAKE NEWS: “By the way, it’s double hearsay, since we’re asked not only to believe what Comey wrote but the unnamed individuals who told the NYT about the memo. The NYT has not seen a copy of the memo.”

Hey, Lois Lerner — who executed a corrupt scheme to target Obama’s political enemies with federal power, remember — got off scot-free due to “prosecutorial discretion.” How’s this different, except, you know, for the lack of a corrupt scheme to target political enemies with federal power?

THE DEMOCRATS’ CULTURE OF ANTI-TRUMP VIOLENCE BEARS MORE FRUIT: Man Arrested For Threatening to Shoot McSally.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: Tips For Reading Washington Post Stories About Trump Based On Anonymous Leaks: In the midst of an active shooter situation, we have tips for how to judge breaking news. We need similar tips to manage anti-Trump breaking news.

Previous Washington Post stories sourced to anonymous “officials” have fallen apart, including Josh Rogin’s January 26 report claiming that “the State Department’s entire senior management team just resigned” as “part of an ongoing mass exodus of senior Foreign Service officers who don’t want to stick around for the Trump era.”

The story went viral before the truth caught up. As per procedure, the Obama administration had, in coordination with the incoming Trump administration, asked for the resignations of all political appointees. While it would have been traditional to let them stay for a few months, the Trump team let them know that their services wouldn’t be necessary. The entire story was wrong.

Rogin also had the false story that Steve Bannon had personally confronted Department of Homeland Security’s Gen. John F. Kelly to pressure him not to weaken an immigration ban. . . .

Each of these stories were explosive breaking news that served an anti-Trump narrative but later turned out to be false.

This week, the Washington Post reported that President Trump threatened national security during his meeting with Russians last week. The story was based on anonymous leaks regarding a real meeting that took place. The report was immediately slapped down as false by multiple high-level Trump officials who were present in the meeting.

It was thoughtful of the Democrats to warn us of this “fake news” phenomenon in November, as they unleashed it.

IT’S DIFFERENT WHEN THEY DO IT: Obama Gave Classified Intel to Russia.

Chief executives share intel when it suits them, but it’s less often that the leader of one country reminds another that “After my election I have more flexibility” to deliver on things his own people might not approve of.

STUART BROTMAN: Net neutrality 2.0: Perspectives on FCC regulation of internet service providers.

UH-OH: South Korea’s Moon says “high possibility” of conflict with North as missile crisis builds.

The comments came hours after the South, which hosts 28,500 U.S. troops, said it wanted to reopen a channel of dialogue with North Korea as Moon seeks a two-track policy, involving sanctions and dialogue, to try to rein in its neighbour.

North Korea has made no secret of the fact that it is working to develop a nuclear-tipped missile capable of striking the U.S. mainland and has ignored calls to halt its nuclear and missile programmes, even from China, its lone major ally.

It conducted its latest ballistic missile launch, in defiance of UN Security Council resolutions, on Sunday which it said was a test of its capability to carry a “large-size heavy nuclear warhead”, drawing Security Council condemnation.

“The reality is that there is a high possibility of a military conflict at the NLL (Northern Limit Line) and military demarcation line,” Moon was quoted as saying by the presidential Blue House.

Moon is thought to be more dovish than his predecessor.

ABC DENIES POLITICS PLAYED A ROLE: Tim Allen ‘Stunned and Blindsided’ by ABC’s Decision to Cancel Conservative-Favorite ‘Last Man Standing.’

IT’S CALLED “MSNBC”: Former Radical Describes Leftist Activism as ‘Cult,’ Saw ‘Murderous Rage’. “I see seemingly reasonable people wishing death on others … “

KAY HYMOWITZ: Unsayable Truths About a Failing High School: A viral student brawl in a once-thriving school highlights public evasions about racial gaps in education.

HMM: Trump Asked Comey to Drop Flynn Investigation, According to Memo Written by Former FBI Director.

President Donald Trump asked then-FBI Director James Comey to back off the investigation of former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn shortly after Mr. Flynn had resigned, according to two people close to Mr. Comey.

The people said they had seen a memo written by Mr. Comey that documented a meeting with the president during which Mr. Trump told the director that he hoped he could find a way to drop the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s probe of Mr. Flynn.

“I hope you can let this go,” Mr. Trump told the former FBI director, according to the memo, which was described in detail by a person close to Mr. Comey. A second associate confirmed having seen the memo and the thrust of its contents. Both requested anonymity to describe the law enforcement record.

The memo isn’t the only one that documents Mr. Comey’s encounters with the president, according to one of the people. There are “a number of encounters with the president that concerned him, and he wrote very detailed memos about those instances,” the person said.

Given that the FBI may already be at war with the Trump White House, it’s going to take more than two anonymous sources and zero physical evidence to give this story credence.

Or as Charlie Martin says, “Show Me the Memos!“

THE RACKETS HAVE ALWAYS BEEN LUCRATIVE: Union Bosses Make More Money Than Private Sector CEOs.

QUESTION ASKED: Will Venezuela’s Government Survive 2017?

The Maduro government enjoys little, if any, public support, and it doesn’t have the money to spend its way out of the problem. Maduro’s approval ratings hover around 21-26 percent, according to the most recent polls. And anecdotal evidence suggests that the actual level of support for Maduro is even lower. His support comes from a strong inner circle and a system based on political patronage. The members of his inner circle need Maduro to stay in office to maintain their livelihoods. Others get access to jobs and other benefits in exchange for their affiliation with the government. Public employees have reported that they must participate in pro-government rallies and show support for Maduro or risk losing their jobs. Now, even neighborhoods like El Valle in Caracas that strongly backed former President Hugo Chavez are turning against Maduro. His inability to continue meeting the promises made by Chavez has caused Maduro to lose this group’s support.

So far, Maduro has resisted resignation and a negotiated exit from power, believing he can withstand the protests against him. Previous negotiations failed in part because Maduro refused to concede on any of the opposition’s major demands. At this point, a change in constraints would be necessary to prompt a change in Maduro’s behavior. This would happen if Maduro feels personally threatened by the unrest. If Maduro believes that his security forces can no longer protect him or that his personal safety is in jeopardy, he will be forced to rethink his stance on leaving office.

If the military and other security forces can no longer keep the protests in check, it will be a game changer for the Maduro government.

Perhaps the final question is whether the security services remain loyal until the bloody end, or turn around and go full Ceaușescu.

CAN WE RELITIGATE OBAMACARE WITH OBAMA’S MOTIVES IN MIND? Judges Who Fret Over Trump’s Motives Are Ignoring US Judicial History.

GOOD MORNING: Start it off smart with Liz Sheld’s morning brief.

FAKE NEWS: I am surprised/not surprised to see the uncomplicated promotion in The Washington Post of positioning a photograph of the top of the head of Sean Spicer to make it appear that he is hiding in shrubbery. “This seems to be one of those times when people think that because their heart is in the right place — here, hating Trump — that whatever they do will work as they intended — such as, here, giving the good people who hate Trump an outlet to express and experience their contempt for Trump. But they don’t think it through. They don’t think of the other values — values they as good people also treasure — that come into play. Specifically, in this case, environmentalism and feminism.”

NEWS YOU CAN USE: Tips For Reading Washington Post Stories About Trump Based On Anonymous Leaks.

But then, some of us have been reading the Washington Post Kremlinologist style for years.

FIZZLE: Gregg Jarrett: Comey’s revenge is a gun without powder.

ROGER KIMBALL: Trump Maintains Momentum Despite Malicious Media. “As I had occasion to note in March, the ‘motor of fake news is not inaccuracy. It’s malice.'”

Plus:

The mournful assumption among many of Trump’s supporters is that the frenzy of media hysteria, though almost comically baseless, is nonetheless dangerous because, on the throw-enough-mud-and-some-will-stick principle, it has an abrading, delegitimizing effect, a drip-drip-drip apodosis that is corrosive of trust.

That may very well be the case. But I suspect nonetheless that the primary victim of the malicious static will not be Trump but the media, which has passed from carping hostility to surreal fantasy.

Two things are happening. On the one hand, the media’s credibility has entered a death spiral. On the other hand, Trump keeps chugging along, toting up victories and setbacks, just like every other successful politician known to man.

The news media apparat is America’s biggest strategic weakness.