ISRAELI BOMBS SEND AN UNAMBIGUOUS MESSAGE TO IRAN: “Tehran can no longer kill Israelis using proxy fighters; terrorists and criminal syndicates then deny responsibility and avoid reprisals.”

It’s additional pressure on the ayatollah regime. No more “gray zone” deniability on the Israeli border.

VERY RELATED: Iran’s brittle regime confronts maximum pressure.

RIDING INTO A FINNISH SUNSET: A USMC M1A1 tank in Finland drills with Finnish military forces. The tank crew is participating in “a low-light live-fire exercise.” Yes, the Finns saw Russia invade Crimea, and they remain alarmed.

RENT-SEEKERS GOTTA SEEK RENTS: Occupational Licensing Reform Is Bipartisan. California Didn’t Get the Message.

A party-line vote in a California legislative committee derailed a promising licensing bill proposed by state Assemblyman Kevin Kiley (R-Rocklin). The bill would not have made any immediate changes to California’s licensing laws; it merely would have created a petition process to allow individuals to ask a board to review and rescind its own regulations—with an eye towards reducing lawsuits challenging particularly onerous rules.

Additionally, the bill would have prohibited licensing boards from denying a license solely because an applicant had unpaid student loans or a criminal record.

But even those relatively mild reforms were deemed too dangerous by Golden State Democrats, who uniformly opposed the measure.

Those Democrats were backed by the special interests that benefit from keeping barriers to employment high.

But of course.

ART OF THE DEAL: “In a break from past administrations, President Trump is using brass knuckles to personally cut deals on trade, military burden sharing, diplomacy, domestic energy production and regulations that aides describe as unprecedented and propelling an economic boom. In several [cases] detailed to Secrets, Trump has confronted world leaders in Oval Office meetings to demand better treatment and pushed his Cabinet secretaries to weigh decisions in favor of taxpayers, according to officials.”

WELL, I THINK CONGRESS SHOULD OBLIGE THEM POSTHASTE: FBI Agents Want Congress To Issue Them Subpoenas So They Can Reveal The Bureau’s Dirt.

SMALL WARS JOURNAL: Turkey’s Triangular Quagmire.

This is a dense piece, but worth a read. I’d just add that Erdogan has spent the last decade or more alienating Turkey’s old (and quite powerful) allies, without making any new ones — all the while stoking Arab fears of a neo-Ottoman resurgence.

DON’T MINCE WORDS, TELL US WHAT YOU REALLY THINK: James Clapper: Leaker, Liar, Sleazeball.

In Clapper and Brennan, the deep state could hardly have chosen worse defenders.

NICE POLLS KID. DON’T GET COCKY. From Blue Wave to Blue Trickle to Blue Gurgle.

SHORT ANSWER: IT’S FAKE. The Problem With CNN’s School Shooting Count: Nearly half of incidents identified this year are unlikely to be recognized by most as school shootings.

BLUE CITY BLUES: Seattle created its homelessness crisis; now it’s trying to make it worse.

So now that we know Seattle’s own laws created a shortage of housing in the city while at the same time reducing the amount of take-home pay for lower-income residents, what is the City Council’s solution? More government.

In 2017, King County and Seattle spent over $195 million to combat homelessness, which included city, county, state, federal and charity spending. Surely the massive amount of spending had an impact on the problem? No, homelessness actually increased last year.

But don’t worry, the City Council has a plan. It had the great idea to institute another tax, known as a “head tax.” The city is going to tax its largest business $500 for every employee. This money would then be used to build “affordable housing.” It is hard to see how that could be done with the current zoning laws, which helped start the crisis in the first place, still in place.

After the City Council voted 9-0 for the ordinance, business leaders spoke out, and Amazon paused construction on a project, pitting hard-working construction workers against do-nothing, full-time protesters. After some negotiating between the City Council and Mayor Jenny Durkan, the head tax was reduced to $275 for every employee.

This may seem like a win, but like everything in Seattle, all is not as it seems. Along with the lower rate, so far the allocation of the funds is non-binding. Meaning there is no plan to spend the money. It could easily be spent on non-homeless issues.

What Seattle has done is so poorly planned, even some of the homeless are calling out the city for its excessive spending.

“Get the hell out of my way!” the wise man once said.

IF YOU PAY MORE, THE SHORTAGE WILL GRADUALLY VANISH: The U.S. Doesn’t Have Enough Truckers.

OUCH: Law firm of Stormy Daniels’ attorney hit with $10-million judgment.

Judge Catherine Bauer of U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Santa Ana ordered the Eagan Avenatti law firm to pay the $10 million to Jason Frank, a lawyer who used to work at the Newport Beach firm.

“At this point, that’s what’s appropriate,” Bauer said at a brief hearing.
To settle his law firm’s bankruptcy, Avenatti had personally guaranteed that the $2 million would be paid to Frank last week, but both he and his firm failed to turn over the money.

At the hearing, the U.S. Justice Department revealed that Avenatti has also defaulted on just over $440,000 in back taxes, penalties and interest that he had personally promised to pay the Internal Revenue Service under another bankruptcy settlement for his law firm.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Najah Shariff told the judge that the federal government would soon file a motion demanding payment.

To be fair, Avenatti has been too busy helping out CNN to keep track of such trivialities.

21ST CENTURY PROBLEMS: Poll: More than 9 in 10 in key states concerned about driverless cars.

Prediction: As Silicon Valley’s reputation sinks, so will the prospects for driverless cars, which require immense trust on all sorts of levels.

CYA: SpaceX’s New Rocket Studied by Air Force, Delaying GPS Upgrades.

The GPS III satellites being built by Lockheed Martin Corp. promise increased accuracy for navigation, a signal compatible with similar European satellites and improved security against cyberattacks. But the satellites meant to upgrade the Global Positioning System, which is widely used for military and civilian applications, are already years behind schedule.

The planned GPS III launch “has slipped due to ongoing SpaceX qualification testing and final engineering reviews by both SpaceX and the Air Force of Falcon 9 design changes,” the Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center said in a statement to Bloomberg News. The service is “working closely” with SpaceX to complete the reviews and issue a “Flight Worthiness Certification just prior to launch,” it said.

The rockets are fine; it’s the paperwork that’s slow.

SHOT: Democrats Shouldn’t Start with ‘Impeachment Trials’ if Party Wins Majority.

-Former Hillary Clinton advisor Jennifer Palmieri.

CHASER: We will impeach Trump if we retake the House.

-Democratic Congressman Al Green.

HANGOVER: GOP Surges to 2018 Generic Ballot Lead in New Reuters Poll.

ANDREW MCCARTHY: “The Trump-Russia investigation did not originate with Page or Papadopoulos. It originated with the Obama administration.”

NOTHING TO SEE HERE, MOVE ALONG: Sweden distributes ‘be prepared for war’ leaflet to all 4.8m homes.

The Swedish government has begun sending all 4.8m of the country’s households a public information leaflet telling the population, for the first time in more than half a century, what to do in the event of a war.

Om krisen eller kriget kommer (If crisis or war comes) explains how people can secure basic needs such as food, water and heat, what warning signals mean, where to find bomb shelters and how to contribute to Sweden’s “total defence”.

The 20-page pamphlet, illustrated with pictures of sirens, warplanes and families fleeing their homes, also prepares the population for dangers such as cyber and terror attacks and climate change, and includes a page on identifying fake news.

One of these things is not like the others. Plus: “The leaflet advises people to think about how to cope if there was no heating, food became difficult to buy, prepare and store, there was no water in the taps or toilet, and cash machines, mobile phones and the internet stopped working.”

Remember when it was only paranoid preppers who worried about such things?

OR A PEACOCK:  New ‘Rainbow’ Dinosaur May Have Sparkled Like a Hummingbird.

BUT THEY’LL NEVER BE CONVICTED BY A JURY OF THEIR PEERS:  More evidence of deep state collaboration with CNN on the Steele dossier.

LIFE OUTSTRIPS THE ONION:  Women’s March defends rapists…

HEADS SHOULD ROLL, OR AT LEAST ORNAMENT PIKES BECAUSE OF THIS:  Jonathan Turley on the “spy”.

MORE LIKE MONEY PRIVILEGE: Black Man Beats Up Jimmy Kimmel Over His ‘White Privilege’ On Gun Control.

IT’S TIME TO TAKE THE GLOVES OFF:  The Niceness Effect.

A DIFFERENT ANSWER TO WHY SCHOOL SHOOTINGS HAPPEN:  The Values We Lost.