ALLIES: Erdogan says Turkish troops to march into northeast Syria.

“We will start the operation to clear the east of the Euphrates from separatist terrorists in a few days,” Erdogan told a conference of arms manufacturers in the capital Tuesday. He said Turkish forces would not attack the US military, which has some 2,000 troops in Syria.

But he poured scorn on US support for the Syrian Kurdish militia, the People’s Protection Units (YPG), which Washington regards as an important ally in the battle against militants of the Islamic State (IS). The YPG is a sister organization of the Kurdistan Workers Party, a Turkish insurgent group classified as terrorist by the United States and the European Union.

In a bid to protect its Syrian Kurdish allies, the US military in northeast Syria has conducted joint patrols with the Syrian Defense Forces, an umbrella group that consists largely of YPG fighters, and erected US-staffed observation towers along the Syrian-Turkish border.

“Our strategic partners (US) are cooperating with the extension of the PKK in Syria. We are saying they are terrorists, but they (US) deny it.” Erdogan said.

While there are Kurds who are terrorists, by and large the Kurdish-run semiautonomous regions of Syria and Iraq are decently run by regional standards, and generally supportive of the United States. When Edrogan speaks of Kurdish terrorists, what he mostly means is the ethnic and ethnographic threat they pose to his regime.

GULFSTREAM FLYERS AGAINST GLOBAL WARMING: Bernie Sanders Spends Thousands More on Private Jet Travel: Socialist senator’s total spending on private jets now over $400k this cycle.

OUR NONPARTISAN, UNBIASED JUDICIARY: The Ninth Circuit’s Activist Midwinter Meeting: The liberal-dominated federal court of appeals lets its partisan and ideological freak flags fly. “None of these panels would be particularly noteworthy as one panel among a host of ideologically neutral or balanced panels more directly related to the Ninth Circuit’s work. But altogether the agenda reads more like the agenda of an activist organization than a federal judicial institution.”

TRADE: ‘Forced tech transfer’ has to stop or be regulated, says EU ambassador to China.

“For the last 40 years, EU companies have provided most of the foreign tech that is in China, about 50 percent of what is today in China,” said Nicolas Chapuis, ambassador of the EU delegation to China.

However, the diplomat expressed concerns about China trading market access for technology.

Beijing sometimes forces foreign companies to hand over their technological know-how in exchange for access to its massive domestic market. The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump has demanded that China cease forced tech transfers, which have become a flashpoint in the U.S.-China trade war.

“This has to stop or to be regulated,” Chapuis told CNBC at the European Chamber Annual Conference 2018 in Beijing.

China pretended to not be an expansionist, revisionist, revanchist, ideological power just long enough to get the tech know-how and tech manufacturing base it needed to take on the West. What happens next is anyone’s guess.

TRANSPARENCY: University of Tennessee launches transparency database that includes contracts, salaries.

Want to know about a University of Tennessee contract? How about a UT employee’s salary?

Those items and more will be available online as part of interim President Randy Boyd’s push to make it easier to find information about the UT System.

The initiative, called “Transparent UT,” will provide public access to information in a centralized online location. The website includes many items often requested of the school system. . . .

Boyd said accountability and transparency is central to who he is as a businessman. Since his appointment as interim president in September, many residents have said they’d like to see more information about how the UT system operates as well as data on its school’s outcomes, he said.

“Not that we haven’t been transparent before, but we will be even more so,” said Boyd during a meeting last week with The Tennessean’s editorial board.

“The core way to empowerment is information.”

The site, tennessee.edu/transparency, will include:

Information on enrollment, student demographics, degrees awarded, retention, graduation rates, post-graduation outcomes, student quality indicators, the number of faculty, faculty workload, research activity, economic development, revenues and expenditures;
Information about the university’s presence and impact in each county;
A searchable employee salary database;
Tuition information;
Executive staff and coaching contracts for each campus;
Information about how the system is funded and how funds are spent;
Other various annual reports;
And endowment investment information.

Some of this stuff — like salaries — was already online but hard to find, but this will put it all together and I think it’s a good idea.

READINESS: US Navy says 3 nuclear-powered attack submarines ‘not certified to dive today.’

The spotlight has been on the USS Boise, which has now been out of service for four years. Vice Chief of Naval Operations Adm. William Moran told senators during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on Wednesday that the Boise would enter a private shipyard in January, but two other submarines “are not certified to dive today.”

The Navy has been working for years to get more submarines into dry dock for maintenance, which now includes the use of private sector shipyards in addition to public ones. As many as 15 subs awaited maintenance in Oct. 2017, keeping a significant chunk of the service’s 71-submarine fleet potentially out of service.

“We want no more Boise’s,” Moran told senators, adding that the other two submarines will enter dry dock in February and late spring.

“The numbers are coming down significantly. The standing in line has come down significantly,” he added. “We still have a ways to go. We’re not out of the woods yet, but I think as capacity opens up in the private yards, and we do a better job in the public yards, getting our carriers out on time, we’ll be there.”

The sequester has played absolute hell with Navy maintenance schedules.

BARRIERS TO ENTRY: California Chief Justice: Bar Exam Results Are ‘Frightening’, But There Are No Plans To Lower The Cut Score.

NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL TAKING THE BOEING: Boeing just launched a new $400 million 777X private airliner, and it’s a flying mansion that can go halfway around the world.

If you have the means…

The upcoming Boeing 777X has some big shoes to fill. The new wide-body is set to be Boeing’s next flagship and the replacement for the iconic 747 jumbo jet.

And now there will be a private-jet version of the airliner.

On Monday, Boeing Business Jets launched the BBJ 777X at the Middle East Business Aviation Association Show in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

“Our most exclusive customers want to travel with the best space and comfort and fly directly to their destination,” Greg Laxton, the head of Boeing Business Jets, said in a statement. “The new BBJ 777X will be able to do this like no other aeroplane before it, redefining ultra-long-range VIP travel.”

That’s a classical reference in the headline.

MICHAEL BARONE on recess appointments.

I don’t want to be a Supreme Court Justice, but I’d love a recess appointment to the Court. It would be fun, and after a year or so I could go back to my normal life. And probably get a book out of it.

MAYBE THE REAL QUESTION IS WHETHER MITT WANTS TO: Is a Trump-Romney Moment Possible?

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: How Many Colleges Will Go Under? Will Yours Be One?

The pessimism of the rating agencies seems justified. Total higher education enrollments in the U.S. have been falling for the last seven years, particularly concerning for the majority of institutions dependent on tuition fees for much of their operating funds. Most current college freshmen were born in or near the year 2000. The number of births in 2005 or even 2009 (potential students a few years from now) was less than it was in 1990. The lifetime fertility rate of American women is at a record low of around 1.8, well below the level needed to avoid long-term population decline in the absence of large-scale immigration. Moreover, anti-immigration attitudes and toughening visa requirements do not bode well for large increases in foreign-born students.

Even more ominous, the prevailing view that “a college education is vital if you are going to be at least modestly successful financially” seems to be changing as the media tells us about former college students suffering from mountains of student loan debt, or students who are underemployed working as baristas or retail sales clerks at wages no higher than what high school graduates make. And the public is impacted by stories of welders making six-digit salaries, or about the desperate need for drivers of long-distance trucks. Mike Rowe of “Dirty Jobs” is viewed as a positive role model. The earnings advantage associated with a college degree has been stagnant for years, even as college costs continue to rise.

If only someone had warned them about this.

AT AMAZON, Shop Amazon Devices – Save on Fire TV Cube.

Plus, Home Gym Savings Galore.

NOW OUT FROM CHRISTOPHER NUTTALL: Para Bellum. The latest in the Ark Royal series. Christopher has been having health problems, so if you’ve been putting off reading his stuff, now might be a good time. I’m sure he’d appreciate it.

UPDATE: I also like the Learning Experience and Empire’s Corps series. I haven’t read any of Schooled in Magic, but people in the comments are praising it.

“WOMEN’S” MARCH PR FIRM’S STUNT BACKFIRES: Even Leftwing Reporters Are Rejecting Their Kind Offer to Stop Talking About the Tablet Story In Exchange for B.S. Spin They’re Not Even Allowed to Publish.

WHY IS HIGHER EDUCATION SUCH A CESSPIT OF RACISM? “This American Life” reveals more than you might expect about how Harvard discriminates against Chinese-American applicants. “In other words, if you want to get into Harvard, don’t be too Asian.”

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: Crime Follies: Overcriminalization, Independent Prosecutors, and the Rule of Law.

OPEN THREAD: Fly like an eagle.

KNOWN WOLF: France shooting suspect Cherif Chekatt was radicalized while in jail.

Related: ISIS Vows Holiday ‘Era of Surprises’ After Strasbourg.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: Visualization Tips for Self-Defense Success.

‘FAKE NEWS:’ Former CIA Analyst Slams WaPo Story Alleging Intel Community Concerns About Trump.

OMG! CALIFORNIA WANTS TO TAX TEXT MESSAGES (SMH).

Could Thingy be next?

ON JOB INTERVIEWS, THEY SERVE AS AN EXCELLENT SORTING MECHANISM FOR HR. Check out the sweet matching tattoos on these democratic socialists:

As several Twitter users have reminded these now ink-stained wretches, this is no different than getting a swastika. I’m so old, I remember when Democrats at least attempted to verbally distance themselves from the Soviet Union.

YOUR DAILY TREACHER: Beto Is a Hit and (Chances Are He’ll) Run. “Dems love a Kennedy. Beto might not have the pedigree, but he has the requisite driving skills.”

Ouch.

ANOTHER LEFTY NARRATIVE BITES THE DUST: U.S. Income More Equal Than Advertised.