MATTHEW CONTINETTI: Pop Goes the Liberal Media Bubble: Trump drives the mainstream media to abandon the pretense of objectivity.

For years, reporters were content to obscure their ideological dogmas and partisan goals behind the pretense of objectivity and detachment. Though the Washington Post, New York Times, and CNN practiced combat journalism against conservatives and Republicans, they did so while aspiring to professional standards of facticity and fairness, and applying, every now and then, scrutiny to liberals and Democrats worthy of investigation.

Donald Trump changed that, of course. He is so unusual a figure, and his behavior so outlandish, that his rise precipitated a crisis in a profession already decimated by the collapse of print circulation and advertising dollars. The forces that brought Trump to power are alien to the experience of the men and women who populate newsrooms, his supporters unlike their colleagues, friends, and neighbors, his agenda anathema to the catechism of social liberalism, his career and business empire complex and murky and sensational. Little surprise that journalists reacted to his election with a combination of panic, fear, disgust, fascination, exhilaration, and the self-affirming belief that they remain the last line of defense against an emerging American autocracy. Who has time for dispassionate analysis, for methodical research and reporting, when the president’s very being is an assault on one’s conception of self, when nothing less than the future of the country is at stake? Especially when the depletion of veteran editors, the relative youth and inexperience of political and congressional reporters, and the proliferation of social media, with its hot takes and quips, its groupthink and instant gratification, makes the transition from inquiry to indignation all too easy. . . .

Supposedly authoritative news organizations have in one case taken up bizarre mottoes, like “Democracy Dies In Darkness,” and in another acted passive-aggressively by filing Trump stories under “entertainment,” only to re-categorize the material as news with the disclaimer (since dropped) that Trump is “a serial liar, rampant xenophobe, racist, misogynist, and birther.” The mode of knee-jerk disgust not only prevents the mainstream media from distinguishing between the genuinely interesting stories and the false, partisan, and hackwork ones. It also has had the effect of further marginalizing print and broadcast journalists from middle America.

Choose the form of your destructor!

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DISPATCHES FROM AMERICA’S LATE-NIGHT CONSCIENCE:

Jimmy Kimmel didn’t spare many feelings at the [2012] White House Correspondents’ Dinner last month. During his address, the late night host took aim at President Obama, New Jersey governor Chris Christie, attendee Lindsay Lohan, and Keith Olbermann, among others. But there’s one target who escaped Kimmel’s crosshairs: former presidential candidate Rick Santorum.

During a visit to Howard Stern’s Sirius XM show this week, Kimmel revealed that he ultimately decided to nix a joke that referenced Santorum’s actions after the death of his infant son. The line: “Newt Gingrich’s campaign is so dead, Mitt Romney wants to baptize it and Rick Santorum wants to put it in a jar and show it to his kids.”

Kimmel was talked out of that grisly “joke” when he ran it past Jake Tapper, who wisely told him “I thought that joke would cause the room to turn against him, perhaps even causing a stampede, with the Hilton getting in on the tar-and-feather concession.”

Classy stuff, Jimmy. As Glenn has noted, “Trump is not the cause of Washington’s decline. He’s a symptom, the wrecking ball that many Americans think was required.”

The above “joke” has a Weimar meets Grand Guignol feel to it (and also dovetails perfectly with Larry O’Connor’s Grand Unified Theory of Hollywood Projection). “First comes the grotesque,” to coin a phrase from 2013.

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NOT LIKELY, THEY’RE TOO COMPLICIT: Will Liberals Give Weinstein the O’Reilly Treatment? “As Camille Paglia noted in a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, prominent feminists like Gloria Steinem didn’t waste any time discarding sexual harassment guidelines when it came to Bill Clinton’s sexual predations as president. Principle rapidly gave way to partisanship and political opportunism. Mr. Weinstein clearly understands this calculus. . . . And if the virtue-signaling isn’t enough, the man who has bankrolled Barbara Boxer, Charles Schumer, Elizabeth Warren, Hillary Clinton, Cory Booker, Kirsten Gillibrand — the list goes on and on — is determined to pay out much more. . . . In her interview, Ms. Paglia noted that, the case of Mr. Clinton, ‘Hypocrisy by partisan feminist leaders really destroyed feminism for a long time.’ She might have added that it also helped Donald Trump get elected.”

TV REPORTER SAYS HARVEY WEINSTEIN MASTURBATED IN FRONT OF HER:

THE McVEGAN “HAM” “BURGER” — STEVE TRIED TO WARN YOU IN 2015 THAT GUSTATORY ABOMINATIONS SUCH AS THESE WERE ON THE WAY:

McDonald’s is almost certainly doomed. Or at the very least, Easterbrook is the wrong guy to head up the burger chain — any burger chain, for that matter.

To understand why I’ve come to this conclusion, read the very next line from the story:

Easterbrook plans to unveil his plan for turning McDonald’s into a “modern, progressive burger company” on May 4.

Now maybe I should withhold judgement until I see this plan next week. Maybe a bold headline like “McDonald’s Is Doomed” is just the kind of baseless clickbait fear-mongering I try to resist indulging in.

But a progressive burger company? Really?

How about a barber shop with shampoo laced with Nair? No, that doesn’t seem like a good idea to you? Let’s talk about it at my bar, where I water down the scotch. No, you’d rather not? Well, that’s how I feel about a “modern, progressive burger company.”

A progressive burger chain is like a quiet rave, a smoke-free poker game, or a free & fair Chicago election.

We all should have known the nightmares that would await us, as we fast-forward to today:

Catchily named the McVegan, it consists of a soy-based patty topped with tomato, salad, pickles and vegan McFeast sauce, sandwiched between a bun. Unfortunately for British vegans, however, the McVegan is currently only available in Finland, and for a limited time only.

—“McDonald’s Trials Vegan Burger,” the London Independent, today.

Reports that a detective named Frank Thorn was heard shouting “SOYLENT McVEGANS ARE PEOPLE! ARE PEOPLE!!!” could not be confirmed.

WEINSTEIN COMPANY RELEASES STATEMENT CONFIRMING THE PRODUCER’S “INDEFINITE LEAVE OF ABSENCE:”

Per their release, “next steps will depend on Harvey’s therapeutic progress, the outcome of the Board’s independent investigation, and Harvey’s own personal decisions.”

Well, that will give him more time to devote to his fights with the New York Times and the NRA, and to dial-up Jay-Z songs on iTunes.

UPDATE: “One-third of the company’s all-male board resigned, while board members who remained hired an outside law firm to investigate the allegations and announced that Mr. Weinstein would take an indefinite leave of absence immediately.”

IF IT WAS HARVEY WEINSTEIN, WELL: Brie Larson isn’t even 30 yet and she was asked out by a much lower-status man. For a Hollywood actress, that’s really, really painful.

CNN: LAS VEGAS SHOOTER TOOK 20 CRUISES, SOME TO FOREIGN PORTS.

In addition to his frequent forays into casinos and gun shops, Las Vegas strip killer Stephen Paddock took 20 cruises, many of them in Europe and the Middle East, investigators have learned.

The cruises included stops at ports in Spain, Italy, Greece, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates, according to information provided by a law enforcement source who asked not to be identified because the source was not authorized to share information about the investigation. Paddock’s girlfriend, Marilou Danley, accompanied him on nine of the cruises.

Developing, as Matt Drudge would say.

FLASHBACK: When Harvey Weinstein lied to Kausfiles.

Mickey still holds a grudge. . . .

JACK DUNPHY: Las Vegas Shooting Reminds Us That Sheepdogs Have to Keep the Wolves at Bay.

Read the whole thing.

CHANGE: Number of vasectomies plunges amid fears relationships won’t last.

MORNING JOE: ‘DEAR LEADER’ TRUMP IS ‘KING’ OF A ‘CULT’

The president as the king of a cult? I just can’t see it myself.

PUERTO RICO HURRICANE DAMAGE MAY LEAD TO DRUG SHORTAGES: “Pharmaceuticals and medical devices are the island’s leading exports, and Puerto Rico has become one of the world’s biggest centers for pharmaceutical manufacturing. Its factories make 13 of the world’s top-selling brand-name drugs, from Humira, the rheumatoid arthritis treatment, to Xarelto, a blood thinner used to prevent stroke, according to a report released last year. With business of nearly $15 billion a year at stake in Puerto Rico, drug companies and device makers are confronting a range of obstacles on the island: locating enough diesel fuel for generators to run their factories; helping their employees get to work from areas where roads are damaged and blocked, electricity is down and phones don’t work.”

One of my law students, who’s Puerto Rican, has made it back home to check on his family, and the pictures he’s sending show tremendous damage.

AS ALWAYS, THERE’S NO WAY ANY SATIRIST CAN COMPETE WITH REAL LIFE FOR ITS PURE ABSURDITY: As Tom Wolfe wrote in the liner notes to the Bonfire of the Vanities, “We live in an age in which it is no longer possible to be funny. There is nothing you can imagine, no matter how ludicrous, that will not promptly be enacted before your very eyes, probably by someone well known.”

Remember the Kronies superhero parody video from a few years ago?

Here’s a headline at Motherboard today: The Military-Industrial Complex Is Marvel’s Newest Sponsor.

Up until now, Marvel Comics only had one arms manufacturer in its roster of superheroes: Tony Stark, better known as Iron Man. Now, it has two.

On Friday, Marvel announced that the company is “joining forces” with Northrop Grumman, manufacturer of the Global Hawk surveillance drone and the fifth-largest arms manufacturer in the world.

The company has already released a comic book starring a new team of heroes who work for Northrop Grumman, called Northrop Grumman Elite Nexus, or N.G.E.N. You know, like “engine,” as in the engine of the B-2 Spirit, a stealth bomber that Northrop manufactured for the US government and dropped bombs over Kosovo and the Middle East.

The comic is titled “Start Your N.G.E.N.S! Part 1,” which means that there’s at least one more part coming in this series, god help us, if not more. The first installment sees a pair of Northrop Grumman operatives teaming up with the cast of the Avengers, one of Marvel’s hottest properties at the moment.

The comic is also marked “all ages,” which means that children can and probably will read this. In short, it’s a marketing tool aimed at kids to get them to think favorably of the military-industrial complex. Nice.

Indeed. Perhaps it’s a way to begin to make amends for veering so deeply into SJW territory in recent years.

TRUMP SHOULD SHOW IRS COMMISSIONER KOSKINEN NO MERCY:

From The Hill:

It’s so far beyond time for President Trump to fire Internal Revenue Service Commissioner John Koskinen that it’s truly unbelievable he’s still there.

What other reasonable conclusion can be drawn from the revelation this week that his agency — already under fire for allowing 700,000 taxpayer files to be hacked two years ago — last Friday decided to award a sole-source, no-bid contract to Equifax, the credit bureau titan that recently revealed it had failed to protect the security of the credit files it holds on 145.5 million Americans?

Read the whole thing.

JIMMY KIMMEL’S REIGN AS “AMERICA’S CONSCIENCE” WAS CERTAINLY A BRIEF ONE:

● Shot: How Jimmy Kimmel became America’s conscience.

—Headline, CNN, Tuesday.

● Chaser: Late-Night Hosts Ignore Harvey Weinstein Sexual Harassment Scandal.

—Headline, Big Hollywood, today.

As John Nolte writes at Big Hollywood, “Silence is Complicity – The Powerful Said Nothing as Harvey Weinstein’s Alleged Victims Piled Up,” and many are still silent even as the dam breaks.

ANTIFA KICKING OFF NEXT WEEK IN STYLE: Antifa Group Plans Nationwide ‘Deface Columbus Day’ Actions for Monday.

Bill de Blasio could not be reached for comment.

REPORT: Slutty women don’t end up single and alone, actually. Though by “slutty,” she seems to mean women who like sex, as opposed to sleeping around indiscriminately.

MICHAEL LEDEEN: The Separatist Wave: Kurdistan, Catalonia, Brexit…

THIS IS A SOMEWHAT MISLEADING HEADLINE: Explosive possessed by Stephen Paddock may have been used in NYC bombing.

The lede makes a bit more sense:

An explosive compound like the one found in Las Vegas mass shooter Stephen Paddock’s car and home is believed to have been used last year in an alleged terrorist bombing in New York City.

Authorities say they recovered an undisclosed amount of the compound known as Tannerite from Paddock’s home in Mesquite and 50 pounds from his car parked at Mandalay Bay, where he used firearms to mow down concertgoers at the adjacent Route 91 Harvest festival on Sunday.

Police have not said why the 64-year-old Paddock possessed Tannerite, which is unregulated and legally used by marksmen to create targets that emit a small cloud of smoke when they are struck. Authorities also found ammonium nitrate, another ingredient that can be used to build bombs, in his vehicle at the site of the shooting.

Yes, as the Las Vegas Review-Journal article goes on to note, Tannerite was used by an Afghan immigrant in a Chelsea district bombing last year in Manhattan that injured 31. It was also used by this guy a decade ago who created a viral video in the early days of YouTube of his Appple G4 blowing up:

So very unlikely an ISIS connection based on that alone, but that isn’t stopping their Twitter account from quadrupling down on their claims. However, at this point, as Rita Katz of the Insite on Terrorism Website writes, “Regardless of Paddock’s motivations, his attack in Las Vegas was a tragic act of evil. But ISIS has come too far to walk back its claims for the Las Vegas attack. Unless it wants its future claims to be dismissed, it will need to provide what it did for flight KGL9268 and other events: proof.”

And more puzzling early details emerge, via NBC:

The investigators are puzzled by two discoveries: First, a charger was found that does not match any of the cellphones that belonged to the gunman, Stephen Paddock.

And second: Garage records show that during a period when Paddock’s car left the hotel garage, one of his key cards was used to get into his room.

There are several possible explanations for these anomalies, the investigators say, but they want to get to the bottom of it.

They are also examining his finances. IRS records show that Paddock was a successful gambler, earning at least $5 million in 2015. Some of that could be from other investments, but most of it was from gambling, officials say.

On Wednesday, Mark Steyn spoke with Tucker Carlson about how, in an era of endless social media,  weirdly blank Paddock’s Internet profile is. There’s video of the interview at Mark’s Website, to which he adds:

Whether or not he sat at gaming tables regularly, a thought occurred to me during the Sheriff’s press conference that this man’s “weirdly blank” public profile (as I put it) is closer to something like a contract killer than a mentally disturbed guy who suddenly snaps. I’m not saying this particular accountant is literally the eponymous accountant of Ben Affleck’s recent movie, but there is a level of efficiency and organization here that separates Sunday night’s carnage from almost all other single-shooter attacks.

So as the days go by this seems less and less like a lone wacko who suddenly cracks up.

Today, Steyn adds:

It is also interesting to note that Stephen Paddock apparently cased the “Life is Beautiful” concert in Las Vegas, headlined by the rapper Chance. The victims at that event would have been very different from those at the country music festival, and the press coverage would have been, too: Democrats would have stampeded down the “white supremacy” track rather than “gun control”. One senses that the killer, in his cold calculations, was aware, for whatever reason, of all these factors.

True, but as Allahpundit notes, the type of venue may have played a larger factor. “My theory for why he might have passed on an attack on the Life Is Beautiful festival was the sheer sprawl of the event, which spread out over 18 blocks. People might have been able to flee in all directions fairly quickly…It’s not the *event* that was key to his decision to attack, perhaps, but the site from which he staged it.”

YOU KNOW, WITH ALL OF THE KNEELING AND BLACK POWER FISTS, THE NFL REALLY NEEDS A HEADLINE THAT WILL QUICKLY WIN BACK THE RIGHT: NFL in Bed with Soros.

Narrator Voice: But this is not that day, today.

Related: Through Week 4, the NFL Shows Massive Viewer Loss Among All Key Demos.

HIPSTER BACKLASH: Stop pretending to like IPAs.

An India Pale Ale, IPA for short, is a strong, hoppy beer that basically gives your tongue a wedgie, noogie and purple-nurple all at the same time, while making your taste buds scream, “Uncle!” And when your little buds do scream, the IPA calls them a wuss. That’s right: IPAs are the bullies of beers, and Americans are falling all over themselves pretending they are delicious.

I know, I know. I just heard that, too. It was the sound of speechlessness. Of pint glasses slipping from hands in cinematic slow-motion before shattering on the floor. Of beer droplets standing on the precipice of beards, beading on the end, as they decide whether or not to jump. Yes, beer drinkers, I went there. I just besmirched the mighty IPA. And no, I will not take it back.

It wasn’t always this way. The IPAs that came out 15-plus years ago, like Racer 5 and Lagunitas, were more balanced and inviting. Sure, they were hoppier and more bitter than other beers, but they weren’t assholes about it. And beer lists weren’t catered just toward them.

Sometime in the past decade, brewers decided beer wasn’t hoppy enough. They began one-upping each other, trying to see who could make a beer so hoppy that the drinker’s face would pucker up like an angry anus. They wanted to see whose beer could make it feel like your tonsils had been stomped out by a street gang.

They wanted to craft beer so hoppy that it would steal you soul.

That last part might be a little hyperbolic, but you get the point.

It needed to be said.