I THOUGHT THAT ONLY HAPPENED IN OLD MOVIES: Guns Found in Violin Case at Fletcher’s Cove in NW DC. Some people are wondering if this is related to some sort of plot against the inaugural, which seems unlikely to me. But I could be wrong.
Archive for 2017
January 17, 2017
D. C. MCALLISTER: ‘PussyHats’ and the Real War on Women.
WHY ARE DEMOCRAT-RUN CITIES SUCH CESSPITS OF RACISM? Race relations still a thorny issue for Boston.
THEN THEY GET ALL OFFENDED WHEN PEOPLE CALL THEM THE OPPOSITION:
THE ATATURK REPUBLIC’S DEATH RATTLE: Bill to cement Erdoğan’s power passes first vote in Turkey.
QUESTION ASKED: Will Japan Stand in Splendid Isolation?
A man of the right, Abe has always stated that his mission was to make Japan a full-fledged sovereign state, free of the vestiges of wartime defeat, like Article 9 of the Japanese constitution, which banned war as an instrument of Japanese foreign policy. Moving away from the U.S. alliance was not, however, one of his priorities. Rather, his strategy has been to use the alliance with the United States to rearm Japan and enable its military to play a greater regional role in containing China, which is the key aim of Japan’s grand strategy.
Now, suddenly, owing to the unpredictable nature of democratic politics in its key allies, Abe and the Japanese elite are being forced to confront fundamental issues that had long been decided by Washington: Tokyo’s relationships with China, Korea, Russia, and Southeast Asia.
For Japan’s elite, it was humiliating to be a semi-sovereign state. But it had its benefits. Among them was Japan’s being able to become an economic superpower in the four decades since the end of the war, partly because it invested very little in defense. And it was comfortable. When things went right, like the U.S.-China rapprochement in the 1970s, Japan could share in the benefits. When things went wrong, like the war in Vietnam, Washington was there to blame, even as Japanese businesses made money from the war.
The Japanese are beginning to realize that being fully sovereign means dealing with headaches for which someone else had to take prime responsibility for over 70 years.
A while back, when asked what the future might hold for aging Japan, I joked, “Picture a giant nursing home, guarded by those Sentinel robots from The Matrix.”
That might end up being more true than amusing.
CHANGE: Mass. Democrats talk up ‘peaceful transfer of power’ at MLK breakfast.
Rep. John Lewis, meanwhile, seems to think that all Republicans are illegitimate:
Related: Stuart Browning: John Lewis’s District Is Rather Sad.
Consider:
-Atlanta, which comprises a large portion of the 5th District, ranks as the 19th most dangerous large city (population 250,000+) in the nation. It has 1,119 violent crimes per 100,000. The national average is about 373.
-In 2016, Atlanta’s high school graduation rate was 71.5 percent. Nationally the rate is 82 percent.
–According to the Atlanta Journal and Constitution, about “1 in 6 families in the district lived in poverty in the previous year. The same dataset estimated the national rate to be about 1 family in 9.”
Lewis has been in Congress for 30 years, yet what do the voters of the 5th District have to show for it?
I wonder if Trump will visit the district and raise that question?
ANDREW MORAN: Obama wasn’t weak on foreign policy – he was just wise enough to realise that Asia, not America, is the future.
We heard a lot of similar talk in the years and even months before mighty Japan, Inc stumbled. Japan is now in its third “Lost Decade.” India (like Brazil) is so mired in corruption that (also like Brazil) it seems doomed as “the superpower of the future — and always will be.” And China? Who knows. If Mark Steyn had it right, then China will grow old before it gets rich.
The bright future, in other words, is always descending in Asia and yet lands only in America.
REMEMBER, LEFTIES WILL ALWAYS TURN ON YOU: Liz Warren once vouched for school vouchers. “Top Trump critic U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren — who’s expected to grill Education Secretary nominee Betsy DeVos tomorrow — once advocated school choice much like the woman she is likely to grandstand against. . . . The Harvard Law professor proposed giving students vouchers to attend any public school they wanted in an attempt to eliminate the current system that often necessitates that students live in a pricey community to attend a good public school. ‘The whole concept of “the Beverly Hills schools” or “Newton schools” would die out,’ she wrote of the vouchers.”
Related: Is Cory Booker Turning Opportunist? If he opposes Betsy Devos, his former ally on school choice, he’ll reveal himself as a garden-variety partisan. “Almost every politician, by definition, is ambitious and seeks a larger stage. But if Cory Booker comes out against Betsy DeVos, he will not only have given the school-choice movement he has championed a slap in the face; he will also have called into question the reputation he had of being a liberal problem-solver.”
Pretty much every time I’ve been told that some promising young urban politician is different, pragmatic, not in the pocket of the usual special interests, etc., it’s turned out to be wrong. I mean, look what happened with Obama.
UPDATE: Oops, Liz Warren link was wrong before. Fixed now. Sorry!
Low taxes, light regulation, and right to work — Michigan should pay attention to Tennessee, because Washington isn’t their problem.
THE NEW YORK TIMES IS INCREASINGLY OUT OF TOUCH EVEN WITH ITS OWN READERS: The 18 highest ranked comments on the NYT article “Chelsea Manning Describes Bleak Life in a Men’s Prison.” Here’s the top-ranked:
As a physician who has worked with prisoners, what bothers me is how many medical amenities Chelsea is getting compared to the average prisoner. Prisoners show up with horrific late stage disseminated cancers because of staff apathy. If a patient shows up struggling to breathe or talk because there’s a laryngeal mass in their hypopharynx closing off their airway and they had to wait 2 years to be seen, why should Chelsea Manning get speech therapy? The system is struggling to have life threatening conditions treated, it is not justified to spend resources on elective therapy.
Manning is getting speech therapy for voice “feminization.” Well, prison health care is government-controlled, and under government-controlled health care, resources get allocated politically. Manning is a political star, and thus gets speech therapy. If you’re in horrible pain from advanced cancer, but you’re a nobody, well, tough. Everything government distributes is allocated politically, and there’s no political constituency that cares about you.
But that’s not news. What’s news is that the NYT has drifted so far left of its own upper-West Side demographic that it’s getting roasted in its own comment sections with increasing frequency.
January 16, 2017
KURT SCHLICHTER PUTS THE BOOT IN: Obama Fades, As Trump Laughs. “The last two months have been hysterically funny as President Faily McWorsethancarter desperately tried to remain relevant. He’s taken leading from behind to a whole new level – he’s actually now behind behind. No one is listening to him. No one cares. While Obama wanders the halls of power, looking for people to pat him on the back, Trump is out there leading. Carrier – saved. Appointments – heading to confirmation. CNN – dissed n’ dismissed. One tweet from Trump and he resets the paradigm like a boss. Ask L.L. Bean. It’s getting hard to handle all this #winning. . . . Nothing will stick to him, nothing will stop him. There’s your tribute, America’s Elite. There’s your legacy, Mainstream Media. Nothing you say matters anymore.”
Thanks to Trump, we may have avoided the fate otherwise ordained for us.
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WE’VE COME A LONG WAY FROM EMMETT TILL: University Hosts MLK Day Teach-In on ‘Oppressive Fashion Trends.’ “This, ladies and gentlemen, is the epitome of a ‘First World problem.'”
THEY CHOSE . . . POORLY: They signed a NeverTrump manifesto. Now, they want a job in the new administration. Or, well, they’re opportunistic, unprincipled, two-faced weenies. Your choice.
I mean, when you sign a “Never Trump” letter, aren’t you blacklisting yourself? Or is the attitude now that that was just pre-election posturing in expectation of Hillary winning, just business and not, you know, personal?
WHY AREN’T MORE AMERICANS MOVING? People used to chase economic opportunity across the country. Then the government got in the way.
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TURKISH POLICE ARREST ISTANBUL NIGHTCLUB ATTACKER:
Turkish police have arrested the main suspect in the New Year’s Eve attack on an exclusive nightclub in Istanbul after a huge manhunt.
Abdulkadir Masharipov is believed to have mounted the assault on the Reina club which left 39 people dead.
The Uzbek national is said to have been caught in Istanbul’s Esenyurt district.
Citizens of Israel, France, Tunisia, Lebanon, India, Belgium, Jordan and Saudi Arabia were among the victims, and dozens of people were injured.
The report includes a summary of the terror attack’s details, a sketch of the investigation and personal information about the terrorist.
DISPATCHES FROM THE MEMORY HOLE: “Newspapers continue to cite the boycott as an unprecedented act….But this isn’t the first time [John] Lewis [D-GA] has boycotted a presidential inauguration. According to a Washington Post article written on January 21, 2001, Lewis and other members of the Black Caucus boycotted George W. Bush’s inauguration because they didn’t ‘believe Bush is the true elected president.’ Lewis spent the day in his Atlanta district.”
UPDATE: “On NBC’s ‘Meet the Press,’ Lewis said the inauguration Friday [of Trump] ’will be the first one that I miss since I’ve been in Congress.’”
K-12 IMPLOSION UPDATE: Maryland School District Employee Fired for Correcting Student’s Spelling.
ABOVE THE FRAY: MLK’s son declines to criticize Trump in feud with Lewis.
Related: MLK’s niece Alveda King says she voted for Trump. “