TRUMP STEALS THEIR WORD: “Normalize.”

MEDIA OUTRAGE VS. POPULAR SENTIMENT: Poll Shows Only 33 Percent Oppose Trump’s Temporary Ban on Immigrants From Terrorist Havens. 57% support. It’s from Rasmussen.

Richard Epstein, on the other hand, is unhappy.

TYPICAL: Trump Protects U.S., World Gets Enraged.

Anger is easy. Doing stuff is hard.

CHANGE: Forget Autonomous Cars—Autonomous Ships Are Almost Here.

WELL, GOOD: Lone Star State Poised to Consider Civil Asset Forfeiture Reform.

Other states could do worse than emulate Texas — on a whole host of issues.

WELL, THAT’S INTERESTING: Physicists have found a metal that conducts electricity but not heat.

I’M STARTING TO LIKE THE CUT OF HIS JIB: Trump Signs Executive Order to Curtail Regulations.

The “one in, two out” plan requires federal agencies requesting new regulations to cut two existing regulations. Trump said the order will reduce the regulatory burdens on the private sector, particularly small businesses.

“If you have a regulation you want, number one, we’re not going to approve it because it’s already been approved probably in 17 different forms,” Trump said while signing the order surrounded by small business leaders. “But if we do, the only way you have a chance is we have to knock out two regulations for every new regulation. So if there’s a new regulation, they have to knock out two.”

On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for all regulations drops to zero.

JUST SAY NO: Why Police Are Saying You Should Hang Up IMMEDIATELY If a Caller Asks ‘Can You Hear Me?’

I get so many spam and scam calls that I rarely use my phone as a phone.

READER BOOK PLUG: Working with the Emotional Investor: Financial Psychology for Wealth Managers.

WELL, THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY, YOU KNOW: This Tiny Submarine Cruises Inside A Stomach To Deliver Drugs.

“FACT”-FINDING MISSION: UK Parliament to Launch ‘Fake News’ Inquiry; Cites Threat.

Politicians determining what the news is — what could go wrong?

DON’T LET THAT STOP YOU: ‘Calexit’ would be a disaster for progressive values.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: British Prime Minister Seeks ‘Credible Alternative’ to Universities.

Hmm. I wonder where she got that idea?

PHILIP K. HOWARD: Civil Service Reform: Reassert the President’s Constitutional Authority: The civil service, once the elixir to ensure good government, has become a cancer killing good government.

He’s got more in the Wall Street Journal, which headlines the argument that the civil service laws are unconstitutional.

DAVID FRENCH: Trump’s Executive Order on Refugees — Separating Fact from Hysteria

Let’s analyze the key provisions, separate the fact from the hysteria, and introduce just a bit of historical perspective.

First, the order temporarily halts refugee admissions for 120 days to improve the vetting process, then caps refugee admissions at 50,000 per year. Outrageous, right? Not so fast. Before 2016, when Obama dramatically ramped up refugee admissions, Trump’s 50,000 stands roughly in between a typical year of refugee admissions in George W. Bush’s two terms and a typical year in Obama’s two terms. The chart below, from the Migration Policy Institute, is instructive:

In 2002, the United States admitted only 27,131 refugees. It admitted fewer than 50,000 in 2003, 2006, and 2007. As for President Obama, he was slightly more generous than President Bush, but his refugee cap from 2013 to 2015 was a mere 70,000, and in 2011 and 2012 he admitted barely more than 50,000 refugees himself.

The bottom line is that Trump is improving security screening and intends to admit refugees at close to the average rate of the 15 years before Obama’s dramatic expansion in 2016. Obama’s expansion was a departure from recent norms, not Trump’s contraction.

Read the whole thing.

THIS SEEMS LIKE NEWS: Gulf Leaders Agree To Trump’s Request To Set Up ‘Safe Zones.’

JUST WHEN YOU THOUGHT ONE WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENTS DINNER WAS TOO MANY:

It takes courage to mock a man who isn’t there.

IS TRUMP GOING AFTER H1B VISAS NEXT? Trump’s Next Immigration Move to Hit Closer to Home for Tech. “If implemented, the reforms could shift the way American companies like Microsoft Corp., Amazon.com Inc. and Apple Inc. recruit talent and force wholesale changes at Indian companies such as Infosys Ltd. and Wipro Ltd. Businesses would have to try to hire American first and if they recruit foreign workers, priority would be given to the most highly paid. . . . The foreign work visas were originally established to help U.S. companies recruit from abroad when they couldn’t find qualified local workers. In many cases, the companies are hiring for highly technical positions in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM. But in recent years, there have been allegations the programs have been abused to bring in cheaper workers from overseas to fill jobs that otherwise may go to Americans.”

UPDATE: As a reader in the comments notes, lefties should love this since they were cheering Bernie Sanders’ attacks on Disney’s H1B abuses.

SCOTT ADAMS: “But lately I get the feeling that Trump’s critics have evolved from expecting Trump to be Hitler to preferring it. Obviously they don’t prefer it in a conscious way. But the alternative to Trump becoming Hitler is that they have to live out the rest of their lives as confirmed morons. No one wants to be a confirmed moron. And certainly not after announcing their Trump opinions in public and demonstrating in the streets. It would be a total embarrassment for the anti-Trumpers to learn that Trump is just trying to do a good job for America. It’s a threat to their egos. A big one.”

TOM MAGUIRE: Normalizing Political Violence At The New York Times. “Just what sort of threats of political violence would actually prompt the NY Times to express concern? Sorry, silly question. Let me rephrase: just what sort of threats of political violence from the left would actually prompt the NY Times to express concern?”

UPDATE: A Trump supporter was just knocked unconscious at Portland Intl. Airport protest of immigration EO.

SALENA ZITO: The Democrats’ diversity challenge.

Today the Blue Dogs are decimated, there are only 17 left, only two of them women. And every year they face expensive, heated primary battles from progressives, and are about to face the same onslaught next year from the 2018 Bernie Sanders purists who want them out of “their” party.

Legendary Democratic strategist Dane Strother thinks that is a very bad idea.

“If the Blue Dogs do not have a seat at the table, and if they do not rebuild, the Democrats will never hold the majority again,” he said bluntly.

Strother added that if there is a progressive purity test, “Then we will be in the wilderness for the next forty years,” he said.

“I think the Blue Dogs have to be revived and respected this cycle. There will be a test. If the party does not back the incumbent Democrat Blue Dog in the primary then the Democrats will have a big problem for a long time.”

Progressivism is a jealous god.

RICK MORAN: FedEx Driver Confronts Flag Burner, Saves Old Glory.

THE NSC REORGANIZATION KERFUFFLE: In terms of organizing and sizing the National Security Council, Trump can do just about anything he wants. The NSC works for him. He can staff it to meet his needs. To say he can’t is Fake News.

The UPI dispatch covers the basics.

Trump also has pared the council to six deputy national security advisers, compared to the 23 on Obama’s council.

Long overdue. Obama stacked his NSC with cronies. Loyalty to him came first. Having political chums or relatives in the mainstream media was an additional qualifier. It sure wasn’t military experience or other types of rubber-meets-the-road national security experience.

Last night Glenn fisked Susan Rice’s latest act of naked hypocrisy. “The troika made up of Susan Rice, Samantha Power, and Hillary Clinton was perhaps the most disastrous foreign policy crew in American history.” Glenn was elaborating on this post at booksbikesboomsticks.blogspot.com.

Trump has decided to downgrade NSC participation by the Director of National Intelligence and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. However, they are statutory advisers. Former SecDef Robert Gates is concerned about that.

“My biggest concern is there are actually, under the law, two statutory advisers to the National Security Council, and that’s the director of [national] intelligence, or the DNI, and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff,” Robert Gates, secretary of defense for Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, told ABC News. “They both bring a perspective and judgment and experience… that every president — whether they like it or not — finds useful.”

However, the mainstream media and usual suspects are acting like the DNI and Chairman JCS are out of the loop. They aren’t. The BBC reports they’ll attend NSC Principals Committee meetings when discussions pertain to their areas.

This ABC News headline indicates we’re dealing with another anti-Trump tantrum. “Trump Gives Controversial Adviser Bannon Seat at Security Council Principals Meetings.

However, ABC does concede that Trump’s reorganization isn’t radical at all:

The invitation-only status of the Joint Chiefs chairman and director of national intelligence is similar to a policy instituted under President George W. Bush.

Another Bush-era policy re-instituted in Trump’s memorandum is separating the Homeland Security Council from the NSC, which President Obama had previously merged.

While it’s not abnormal for presidents to restructure the makeup of their National Security Council, the addition of Bannon, the former publisher of Breitbart News, to the Principals Committee has brought scrutiny over the adviser’s influence in Trump’s inner circle.

I think the Dems and their media pals have gone tantrum-tilt because Trump wants Steve Bannon to serve on the NSC. During the campaign Dems and the mainstream media committed themselves to the narrative that Bannon is Rasputin and Hitler and etc. Is he a political adviser? Yes. However, Bannon was also a naval officer. The UPI release mentions that George W. Bush barred Karl Rove from attending NSC meetings. OK. Rove was a political adviser but he never served in the military. Bush was a USAF reserve pilot. Bush combined political experience and military experience. Like Obama, Trump has no personal military experience. Bannon has political savvy and military experience. In this light Bannon very likely meets a need Trump perceives. So Trump hires him. Did Obama perceive a similar inadequacy in himself? Of course he didn’t. Obama, the purveyor of Smart Diplomacy, was always the smartest guy in the room. Obama’s national security record? Why, it’s dismal. Perhaps he could have used a Steve Bannon.

PROCUREMENT: Trump calls for more submarines — for less money.

EB and Newport News Shipbuilding build two Virginia-class attack submarines a year. Former Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus, in one of his last visits to EB, handed out mock punch cards that said “Buy 9 subs, get the 10th one free!” referencing the $2 billion in savings achieved through a $17.6 billion contract, the largest in Navy shipbuilding history, awarded to EB in April 2014.

When negotiating that contract, certain initiatives were implemented to reduce design costs, the most significant of which was a redesigned bow that included a new sonar array and two larger payload tubes instead of 12 individual, vertical-launch missile tubes. Twenty percent of the ship’s design was changed to save about $100 million per submarine. Other cost-saving measures include the ability to buy materials far in advance.

“Those of us who have worked with EB over the years know that affordability is a factor in their business model,” said Bob Ross, executive director of the state’s Office of Military Affairs.
The company is “well aware” of how “incredibly expensive” it is to build submarines, and works “very hard to be as efficient and affordable as they can,” Ross said.

But he noted that a high price tag is inevitable, given the advanced technology being built.
“There’s more technology in the Virginia-class submarines than in the space shuttle program. It’s never going to be a low number,” he said.

The Virginia-class attack subs have been a rare post-Cold War procurement success for the Navy, with boats coming in ahead of schedule and under budget. I’m not sure how much more in savings Electric Boat can wring out of the program, particularly Congress approves an increased production rate and the increased facility investments that would be required.