CAN OF WORMS, OPENED: DOJ Inspector General reviews alleged FISA abuses by DOJ, FBI.

Here’s the OIG release. But we still need a special counsel on this, too.

MEET THE CLINTON CHARITY THEY DON’T WANT YOU TO KNOW ABOUT: When Bill and Hillary and Chelsea have nightmares, you can bet Charles Ortel is right in the middle of them. And with a multitude of good reasons why.

BLUE ON BLUE: Apple’s Tim Cook rebukes Zuckerberg over Facebook’s business model.

“We could make a ton of money if we monetized our customers, if our customers were our product,” Cook said in an interview with Recode and MSNBC that will air on 6 April. “We’ve elected not to do that … We’re not going to traffic in your personal life. Privacy to us is a human right, a civil liberty.”

Cook also said that it is past time to regulate Facebook. “I think the best regulation is no regulation, is self-regulation,” he said. “However, I think we’re beyond that here.”

The comment echoed remarks Cook made in Beijing last week, when he said: “I think that this certain situation is so dire and has become so large that probably some well-crafted regulation is necessary.”

Cook, 57, did not have any suggestions for how Zuckerberg should address the fallout from the privacy scandal. Asked what he would do if he were Zuckerberg, Cook shot back: “I wouldn’t be in this situation.”

Ouch.

THIS DAY IN CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORY: On March 29, 1961, the 23^rd Amendment, giving the District of Columbia representation in the Electoral College, was ratified. Since then, D.C.’s 3 electoral votes have been reliably cast for the Democratic candidate.

Early in the Republic’s history, the argument sometimes advanced against giving government employees the vote was that they have a conflict of interest: They will always vote for the candidates who favor higher spending. The argument wasn’t entirely crazy.

IT WOULD BE BETTER FOR THE COUNTRY IF HE JUST PARDONED EVERYONE IN ADVANCE: White House: No talk of pardons in Russia probe ‘at this time.’

DEEP STATE: Minneapolis FBI agent charged with leaking classified information to reporter.

Terry James Albury, who was assigned as Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport liaison working on counterterrorism matters, was charged this week by the Justice Department’s National Security Division with one count of “knowingly and willfully” transmitting documents and information relating to national defense to a reporter for a national news organization. Albury was also charged with a second count of refusing to hand over documents to the government.

Albury is the second person charged for leaking secret documents to Intercept. In June 2017, an intelligence contractor was charged with leaking a classified report about Russia’s interference in the 2016 election to The Intercept, the first criminal leak under President Trump.

The Justice Department has vowed to crack down on leaks that it contends undermine national security.

A search warrant filed in Minneapolis federal court against Albury did not identify the news outlet, but a review by MPR News found the documents described in the search warrant that Albury leaked exactly match the trove of FBI documents posted by The Intercept.

More at the link.

CLOSED MINDS IN MASSACHUSETTS HELP PROP UP PUTIN’S PLUTOCRACY: Environmentalists in Massachusetts and New York are determined to keep abundant U.S. energy resources “in the ground.” So what happens when the Northeast gets repeated bouts of unusually cold weather, as has been the case in 2018? Natural gas from Russia is unloaded in Bay State ports. There’s a protectionist union factor here, too. LifeZette’s Brendan Kirby has all the details.

DAVID HARSANYI: You Can Try To Repeal The Second Amendment, But You Can’t Repeal History.

Whether repeal of the Second Amendment is feasible or not, historical revisionism is meant to mangle its meaning into irrelevancy. [Former Justice John Paul] Stevens claims that his conception of gun rights is “uniformly understood,” yet offers no legal precedent to back the contention up. Stevens claims the Second Amendment’s explicit mention of “the right of the people” does not create an “individual right” despite the inconvenient fact that other times the term is mentioned — in the Fourth, Ninth, and 10th Amendments — they have been found to do exactly that.

Now, I’m not a legal scholar, but the idea, as the former justice argues, that the Founders wanted no limits on the ability of federal or state authorities to take weapons from law-abiding citizens conflicts with the historical record. Never once in the founding debate did a lawmaker rise to argue that gun ownership should be limited. Most state constitutions already featured language to protect that right. A number states demanded that the national constitution include such a provision, as well.

The debate over the Second Amendment centered on a dispute over who should control the militia, the federal or state governments. Everyone understood that a militia consisted of free individuals who would almost always grab their own firearms — the ones they used in their everyday existence — to engage in concerted efforts to protect themselves, their community, or their country (sometimes from their own government.)

This might surprise some, but the Minutemen did not return their muskets after Lexington.

Well, yeah — Lexington was fought over an attempted gun grab by the British, and the Minutemen were no dummies.

And former Justice Stevens is counting on the historical ignorance of his fellow Americans.

THE REGULATORY STATE AT WORK: Shampooing Hair And Piloting Commercial Airliners Require Same Number Of Training Hours In Michigan.

SOONER THAN LATER: South Africa may become the next big promoter of terrorism and piracy.

When the late anti-Apartheid activist Nelson Mandela emerged from prison and became South Africa’s first black president, he carefully steered the country away from the radicalism of the African National Congress’s Marxist past and toward a policy which embraced moderation and responsibility in international affairs. Rather than precipitate conflict, he sought to mediate and resolve. South Africa gained widespread respect as a country embracing peace and looking toward the future rather than catalyzing the radical causes which have sown conflict around the continent and wider world.

Alas, Mandela was unable to make his changes permanent. After his five-year presidential term ended in 1999, and especially after his 2013 death, the leaders who followed Mandela—Thabo Mbeki, and especially Jacob Zuma and now Cyril Ramaphosa—have spent South Africa’s moral capital shilling for increasingly radical regimes, terrorist groups, and causes.

You want more shithole countries? Because this is how you get more shithole countries.

ANALYSIS: TRUE. “Once you accept the proposition that the left believes in nothing but power (truth being defined whoever has power) and not principles (after all, principles are defined by the oppressor), then their actions are much easier to understand.”

Related: We Have Noted Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Absence From The Effort To Get Kevin Williamson Fired.

BEN WEINGARTEN: Left and Right are Both Wrong to Wage War on Big Tech With Big Government. “Turning to the government to challenge private enterprises is not the answer.”

IT’S NOT EVERYDAY ONE OF ONE’S FRIENDS WHO ARE LIKE FAMILY (DR. ROBERT HAMPSON) MAKES SCIENCE FICTION REAL:  Alzheimer’s memories could be switched back on with implant.

THAT IS DEFINITELY NOT MY SHOCKED FACE:  Men are ‘zapping’ their penises to treat erectile dysfunction.

AH, YES, SWEDEN.  NEVER CHANGE:  The Left’s Doomed Crusade to Erase Gender Differences.  Maybe it’s something in the pickled herring…

IF WE START LISTING ALL THE THINGS OBAMA DIDN’T KNOW, WE’LL BE HERE ALL NIGHT:  Obama didn’t know healthcare could be so complicated.

DOES THE SMELL BOTHER ANYONE ELSE?  FoxNews: “Documents suggest possible coordination between CIA, FBI, Obama WH and Dem officials early in Trump-Russia probe: investigators.”

OKAY.  I’M NORMALLY AGAINST GOVERNMENT REGULATION, BUT SOMETHING MUST BE DONE TO STOP ASSISTED LIVING FACILITIES FOR ELDERLY FOLK CUTTING METAMUCIL WITH MESCALINE:  Justice Stevens op-ed: get rid of the Second Amendment.

TIMELY:  Jack Carr’s ‘Terminal List’ Taps Into Our Deep State Fears.

CAN’T STOP THE SIGNAL:  Meet the Conservative Comics Facebook Can’t Stop Banning.

ANOTHER LEFTIST FREAKOUT? AT THIS RATE THE COUNTRY WILL RUN OUT OF XANAX:  The Census, Citizenship and the Question.

NO.  BUT IT’S OKAY, WE DON’T TRUST THE MEDIA, EITHER:  After #FaceBookDataLeaks, the Media Would Like to Know If We Trust Mark Zuckerberg.

THE MASKS ARE COMING OFF:  Trump and the Great Unmasking of the Left.

IT’S A CHILDISH PHILOSOPHY:  Of Course Children Prefer Liberalism.