YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK: Hacking attacks on businesses and civilians worldwide from leaked NSA hacking tools.

ABA FINDS JUSTICE DON WILLETT “well qualified” to serve on Fifth Circuit.

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ROGER KIMBALL: I’VE GIVEN UP ON TRUMPISM, BECAUSE THERE’S NO SUCH THING:

Query: why does Max say that the wisdom of America’s voters was “dubious”? For the same reason that Bill Kristol, to take another prominent NeverTrumper, is organizing a Committee Not To Renominate the President. Bill wants to liberate “conservatism from Trumpism.”

But what is the “Trumpism” from which he wishes to liberate us conservatives? Max Boot, Bret Stephens, and other anti-Trump pundits have told us repeatedly that Donald Trump is a “fascist.” What can that mean? They have read their George Orwell. They know as well as anyone that “fascist” in the context of modern American society is simply a term of abuse, a negative epithet impatient people apply to things and people they do not like. In this respect, “fascist” is a lot like “racist” when deployed on college campuses these days.

Donald Trump’s real tort, I believe, was to have somehow gotten himself elected despite the objections and without the permission of people like Max Boot. . . .

While you are waiting for evidence of these claims, Max wants you to know that he thinks “Trump has been utterly incompetent. Even if he wants to achieve more of his agenda, he doesn’t know how to do it.” He is, you see, “ignorant, petulant, unethical, avaricious, conspiratorial, nasty, shameless, bullying, egomaniacal.”

Quite a litany. But what this really means, I think, is that while Donald Trump’s election was supposed to be impossible, it is still utterly unacceptable. The fantasy of “Trumpism” is an expression of that state of affairs. Even before Trump was elected, some academic historians, fired by nostalgia for the radicals of the 1960s and their protests against the Vietnam War, created a group called “Historians Against Trump” to protest the “dangerous ideology of Trumpism.” “The lessons of history,” they intoned, “compel us to speak out against a movement rooted in fear and authoritarianism.”

Where is the fear? Where the authoritarianism?

I believe that one of the great embarrassments confronting the persistent anti- or NeverTrumpers has been, pace Max Boot, the utter failure of their fantasies about Donald Trump to materialize. He was supposed to be a horrible, xenophobic, racist, militaristic cad, but how has he actually governed?

I have several times, in this space and elsewhere, provided periodic reality checks comparing the hysteria of the anti- or NeverTrumpers to Trump’s actual accomplishments. The list of those accomplishments grows longer and more impressive as the months go by.

Read the whole thing.

I BLAME ALL THE ELIMINATIONIST RHETORIC FROM THE LEFT: SPLC Hate Map Arson? North Carolina Church Burnt and Spray Painted ‘Anti-Gay Hate Group.’

IT’S ACTUALLY CTHULHU: Rare footage captures giant jellyfish living under Arctic ice.

THEY SEEM TO BE HAVING TROUBLE SETTLING THE SCIENCE ON THIS THING: New Blood Pressure Guidelines Mean Yours Might Be Too High Now.

BRIDGET JOHNSON: Don Jr., WikiLeaks Communicated Through Critical Stage of Campaign.

IS THERE ANYTHING IT CAN’T DO? Just 1 Cup of Coffee a Week May Lower Risk of Stroke & Heart Failure.

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RON RADOSH: The GOP Prepares to Die, as the Alabama Republicans Stick by Judge Roy Moore.

THANKS TO RIPPETOE WORKOUTS AND A SENSIBLE DIET, I’M BACK TO WEARING SIZE 34 JEANS: The Growing Toll of Our Ever-Expanding Waistlines. I still use the Livestrong app to count calories, carbs, and protein. I don’t think it’s the best one out there, necessarily, but I’m used to it.

FREE SPEECH IS SEXY AGAIN: The Supreme Court has granted certiorari to six First Amendment cases this term, reports Bloomberg‘s Greg Stohr, three of them just yesterday.

They include a high-profile fight over a Colorado baker who refuses to make cakes for same-sex weddings and a challenge to the requirement in some states that public-sector workers pay for the cost of union representation […] In the new California case, a state law requires licensed pregnancy clinics to tell patients that they can call a county health department to learn about state-funded prenatal, family planning and abortion services. The law is being challenged by clinics that oppose abortion […] The justices also said Monday they will use a Minnesota case to consider guaranteeing people the right to wear political apparel when they go to the polls to vote. The final case involves a man who says he was arrested in retaliation for suing and politically criticizing his local government.

Not surprisingly, law professors are all over the place on what it means and what will happen. Harvard Law prof Rebecca Tushnet told Bloomberg that “the current court interprets the First Amendment more expansively in many ways than it did in the past,” while Eugene Volokh, a First Amendment scholar at UCLA School of Law says the latest issues are “mostly variations on topics the justices have been debating for decades.”

**DISCLOSURE: I defended Greg Stohr for more than 12 years at Bloomberg and did the pre-publication vetting of his book “A Black and White Case” about the landmark Gratz v. Bollinger affirmative action case.

JEAN-LOUIS GASSÉE HAS A Dare To Congress: Go Ahead, Vote A Golden Key Encryption Law.

Above all else, politicians play the crowd, it’s how they keep their jobs. The ostentatious plea for “responsible encryption” is mere grandstanding aimed at gaining Law and Order votes from people who justifiably don’t like the idea of Bad People being able to hide their communications from authorities.

The grandstanding often takes the form of a hackneyed hypothetical: A terrorist is hiding the location of a dirty bomb on his smartphone. Who wouldn’t want a trusted government agency to unlock the device and save a city?

The hypothetical isn’t just painful, it’s dishonest and manipulative.

Instead of arguing, let’s issue a dare to Congress: Stop dickering already and enact a law that would compel any entity that makes, sells, or uses encryption to place the one and only decryption key for their product or service — the Golden Key — in escrow with a newly created REA, the Responsible Encryption Agency.

Congress, will you stop the posturing and vote for such a law?

No. They would come to their senses and see the ugly consequences of the legislation.

I’m less sanguine about the wisdom of the elected masses.

WELL, GOOD: Inside the Decades-Long Fight for Better Emergency Alerts.

Earlier this month, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai announced the commission would move forward with an Obama-era order calling for wireless carriers to pinpoint emergency alerts down to the cellular tower level. Until recently, these alerts have targeted entire counties, an area so vast that, typically, people either receive alerts that are irrelevant to them, or emergency managers forgo alerts altogether—with potentially disastrous consequences. The alerts will also include embeddable links that can redirect people to additional information.

For public safety and communications experts, including Wheeler, these upgrades represent a crucial step in a multiyear battle with the cell phone industry.

“It is great the FCC has announced they’re going to do something,” Wheeler says. “Too bad it took tragedies to get that to happen.”

It usually does.

BIDEN 2020: Prehistoric Dinosaur Found Alive.

FAITH MOORE: Why Would Anyone Want to Do This? Paris Opens First Nudist Restaurant.

Ask for extra napkins. Lots of extra napkins.

SO THE UPSHOT IS THAT WHILE ORDINARY WORKING GUYS HAVE TO ATTEND HR SEMINARS TELLING THEM NOT TO COMPLIMENT SOMEBODY’S SWEATER, THE POWERFUL GUYS ARE BEING COVERED FOR: USC had many warnings about medical school dean’s behavior but took little action.. And, often, covered for by the same people requiring the seminars.

NO. The Fanny Pack Has Returned. Now Cheer. Or Cringe.

In July of 2014, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, the actor, former pro wrestler and hulk with a heart of gold, posted a self-mocking throwback photo on Instagram. There he was in all of his dated ’90s attire: a Steve Jobsian-black turtleneck, washed jeans and—slung around his waist—a brown leather fanny pack. A fanny pack on the Rock?! How absurd! Instantly, “Fanny Pack Rock” became a meme pinging about the internet.

The viral sensation reached a new peak when the Rock hosted “Saturday Night Live” last May: In promo photos, he gamely posed in an identical outfit, right down to the lookalike fanny pack at his waist. Sure, laughter ensued, but the fanny pack’s reputation was being transformed. Legitimately stylish people began to reevaluate the lumpen, pancreas-shaped bag, most typically seen tied to tourists in Bermuda shorts, ’80s ravers in Burning Man tie-dye or—most damning of all—your mom out for a jog. The fanny pack started showing up in luxe leathers and sleek nylons at designer labels such as Balenciaga and Louis Vuitton.

That came as a surprise, even to trend forecasters. “Fanny packs, or ‘waist bags’ as we now call them, are the fastest-growing segment in the men’s accessories market,” explained Marshal Cohen, an analyst with the NPD Group, a market research firm. Between September 2016 and this September, sales of the category increased by over 10%, reaching $100 million.

This is not a part of the ’90s I was hoping we might relive.

SO “SAFE SEX” NOW INCLUDES CPR TRAINING: Sex unlikely to stop your heart—but if it does, your partner may let you die.

ROGER KIMBALL: Why I Have Given Up on Trumpism.

Donald Trump’s real tort, I believe, was to have somehow gotten himself elected despite the objections and without the permission of people like Max Boot.

Max confided that he went “to bed late on the evening of Nov. 8, 2016, in a daze, incredulous that my fellow citizens could elect a man so unqualified for the presidency.” The American people really let Max down. And they persist in their outrageous behavior. According to Max, “Trump doesn’t really believe in much beyond his own awesomeness. He didn’t run for office to get anything done; he ran to stoke his own ego and pad his own bank account by increasing his visibility.”

While you are waiting for evidence of these claims, Max wants you to know that he thinks “Trump has been utterly incompetent. Even if he wants to achieve more of his agenda, he doesn’t know how to do it.” He is, you see, “ignorant, petulant, unethical, avaricious, conspiratorial, nasty, shameless, bullying, egomaniacal.”

Quite a litany. But what this really means, I think, is that while Donald Trump’s election was supposed to be impossible, it is still utterly unacceptable. The fantasy of “Trumpism” is an expression of that state of affairs. Even before Trump was elected, some academic historians, fired by nostalgia for the radicals of the 1960s and their protests against the Vietnam War, created a group called “Historians Against Trump” to protest the “dangerous ideology of Trumpism.” “The lessons of history,” they intoned, “compel us to speak out against a movement rooted in fear and authoritarianism.”

Where is the fear? Where the authoritarianism?

The Left projects, always.

SO ONE OF MY COLLEAGUES JUST UPDATED HIS iMAC TO THE NEW HIGH SIERRA VERSION AND IT BRICKED IT. I’ve seen other folks complaining about that on social media. So if you’ve got a Mac, maybe hold off on that one. . .

I’M MORE CONCERNED WITH EFFICACY THAN WITH ETHICS: The Ethics of Using Brain Implants to Upgrade Yourself.