HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: A University of Northern Colorado professor told students that she hopes they can “find something to celebrate” on Independence Day despite “a ton of ugliness in our nation’s past and present.” When taxpayers tire of supporting this sort of thing, we’ll be told it’s because of “anti-intellectualism.”
Archive for 2018
July 5, 2018
LIZ SHELD’S MORNING BRIEF: The Statue of Liberty Gets Occupied and Much, Much More. “Welcome to the new normal, where every aspect of your life will be infected with politics.”
IMRAN AWAN CANNOT BE BOTH GUILTY AND INNOCENT: That’s the rot at the heart of the Awan case: The Department of Justice (DOJ) says it found no evidence the Pakistani former IT aide abused his access to the congressional computer networks or committed procurement fraud, while the House Sergeant-at-Arms and the House Chief Administrative Officer warned Congress that he was “an ongoing and serious risk to the House of Representatives.” It’s basic logic — that which is A cannot also be Non-A.
The more interesting twist here, though, is the fact President Donald Trump a month ago specifically and directly warned DOJ not to let Awan off the hook, or his chief congressional patron, former Democratic National Committee Chairman, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz. There are no known Russian connections to the Awan case, so it could be the spark that moves the president to take action against DOJ.
ASKING THE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS: Will the F-35 have laser weapons in the future?
The US military and its allies have allocated millions of dollars for directed energy research and development. The US Air Force is pursing laser weapon systems for installation on fighter jets as well as the AC-130J Ghostrider gunship.
The UK also recently announced its interest in demonstrating a directed energy based defence system, similar to Phalanx, for its warships.Lockheed Martin, Notre Dame University, DARPA and the Air Force Research Lab last year started flight testing a streamlined and miniaturised airborne laser turret.
The turret allows for 360 degree aiming coverage for directed energy weapons that will be flying on military aircraft in the not so distant future and is able to rapidly aim at targets and focus a directed energy burst through the atmosphere at those targets to disable or destroy them.
Now that’s the 21st Century I’ve been hoping for.
ON THE ONE HAND, THERE ARE PLENTY OF DISTINCTIONS. ON THE OTHER HAND, TRUMP IS THE MOST LIBERTARIAN, AS WELL AS THE MOST CONSERVATIVE, PRESIDENT TO SERVE IN NEARLY A CENTURY: At Their Convention, Libertarians Struggle To Distinguish Themselves From Trump. Granted, it hasn’t been a libertarian century . . .
BLUE WAVE? Democrats Underperforming With Hispanic Voters. “Despite the president’s hard-line immigration policies, Republican candidates are running competitively in many Hispanic-heavy states and congressional districts.”
I’m not sure about that word “despite,” but here’s more:
Rep. Will Hurd of Texas once looked like one of the most vulnerable House Republicans, representing a border district where Hispanics make up 70 percent of the population—a seat Hillary Clinton carried by 4 points in 2016. Hurd has long been an independent GOP voice, emerging as a critic of Trump’s border-wall proposals and a supporter of a path to citizenship for Dreamers. But, as Democrats frequently bring up, he’s also a congressman whose partisan affiliation will help keep Republicans in charge of the House.
He’s in surprisingly good shape as he vies for a third term against Democrat Gina Ortiz Jones. Despite holding one of the 25 GOP seats that Clinton carried, he’s not on the list of The Cook Political Report’s most endangered 31 members. His Texas colleagues John Culberson and Pete Sessions, representing suburban Houston and Dallas districts where Republicans traditionally dominate, are in deeper trouble. It’s a crystal-clear sign that the anti-Trump anger is concentrated within whiter, affluent suburban communities, not the Hispanic battlegrounds with the most at stake.
Much more at the link.
JOURNALISM: Michael Walsh: No Virgins in the Gray Lady’s Whorehouse.
Just when you thought contemporary journalism couldn’t sink any lower, along comes Ali Watkins, now 26, a reporter for the New York Times whose rapid rise through reporting’s corrupt and partisan ranks includes stints at the Huffington Post, BuzzFeed, and Politico. Back in February, Ms. Watkins suddenly became the object of official attention when the feds seized her email and phone records as part of an investigation into a prominent Senate staffer, James Wolfe — the former security director for the Senate Intelligence Committee and a Democrat, of course. Then, in June, Wolfe was arrested and charged with lying to the FBI, which was investigating leaks from the committee to select reporters… among whom was Ali Watkins.
It turns out that Watkins had been involved in a sexual relationship with Wolfe for three years, although at the time of Wolfe’s arrest she had moved on to greener pastures, including other staffers on the committee. . . .
A responsible journalistic organization would never have hired this little scamp, but at the Times, which is hell-bent on turning its formerly white male newsroom into a model of “diversity,” being female trumped all other considerations, and the newspaper is clearly grooming Watkins for bigger things. But now that the truth is out about how this particular reporter got her scoops, a responsible journalistic organization would have fired her.
The Times, alas, is not that journalistic organization.
Nope. And, really, never has been.
DISPATCHES FROM THE EDUCATION APOCALYPSE: The Coming Implosion After Diversity’s Victory.
SETH BARRET TILLMAN: Poland’s Judicial Crisis: My Post on CONLAWPROF.
CONRAD BLACK: On Immigration and the Supreme Court, Democrats Are Snookered: And their only serious leader may be Michael Bloomberg, who will be 78 in 2020. “One overconfident position of Trump’s enemies after another has been overrun, and now they are having to face the most blood-curdling horror of all: He may durably uproot and expel them from their incumbency and legitimacy as a permanent government, and he may actually succeed as a president. This is the explanation for the mushroom cloud of Democratic disconcertion about the ambivalent Anthony Kennedy. He provided the deciding vote on the three cases mentioned that closed this session of the Court, but he was pro-choice, pro the legality of Obamacare, and as liberal as he was conservative. All of the nominees on the president’s list of 25, from which the well-respected Justice Neil Gorsuch was chosen last year, are clearly qualified. All, when probed about abortion, will say something like what Circuit Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett, a practicing Roman Catholic with seven children, replied at her confirmation hearing, that no judge should allow personal views to get in the way of established law.”
SUCH A PERFECT ENCAPSULATION: Happy Birthday, America!
IS THAT A RECORD?: Sessions withdrew 24 guidances on Tuesday, the vast majority from the Obama Era.
There are more that need to go–including the school discipline guidance. But Tuesday’s action looks like real progress.
WHEN WRITERS DRINK THEIR OWN INK: Op-Ed Claims Every Gun Is An Assault Weapon.
MUST HAVE BEEN HARD TO CHOOSE ONLY TEN: Ten Dumbest Things I Heard About Guns At The United Nations.
BLOWING UP TAXPAYER’S MONEY: Feds Blow Up Dummies on Mall to Warn Against Celebrating the Fourth With Fireworks, Sparklers.
THEY’RE OFF THEIR MEDS: David Brock’s Top Researcher Convinced Nazis Infiltrated DHS.
WAIT! HE’LL NEVER LIVE LONG ENOUGH TO TURN MEXICO INTO VENEZUELA: Mexico’s president-elect shuns guards, asks ‘people’ for protection.
THOSE WHO ARE NO LONGER OUR COUNTRYMEN ARE DISTURBED BY OUR LOVE OF AMERICA: The patriotism gap.
A FRIEND WHO’S HAD A SIMILAR JOURNEY: A Real American.
I’VE BEEN AN AMERICAN CITIZEN FOR 30 YEARS: Conceived in Liberty.
July 4, 2018
SARAH HOYT: Conceived in Liberty.
It’s Sarah Hoyt, so read the whole thing.
FOUR SCORE AND SEVEN YEARS AGO, our fathers brought forth, upon this Blogosphere, a new open thread, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all InstaPundit commenters are created equal.