Archive for 2018
January 7, 2018
PETAFLOPS. I REMEMBER WHEN MEGAFLOPS WERE A BIG DEAL. With the Summit Supercomputer, U.S. Could Retake Computing’s Top Spot: Oak Ridge’s 200-petaflop Summit supercomputer will come on line in mid-2018.
THE LEFT WANTS TO TALK ABOUT MENTAL HEALTH. LET’S START WITH THEIRS.
WELCOME TO THE BACKLASH TO THE BACKLASH: Academy members now regret banning Weinstein so hastily.
When Hollywood’s most prestigious organization, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) — the group of nearly 7,000 actors, directors and other industry types who dole out the Oscars — expelled Harvey Weinstein on Oct. 14, audiences applauded. But by acting so swiftly, a mere nine days after the New York Times first reported allegations of sexual assault against the movie producer, the outfit now finds itself facing a dilemma.
Put simply: What to do with the rest of them?
“Harvey opened the floodgates,” said one male Academy member. “Now the Academy’s drowning in a tide of s—t. They don’t know what hit them.”
As Twitchy notes, “They’re not worried about the fact that Hollywood is full of sexual offenders, they’re worried about what will happen to the Academy.” Why is Democrat-dominated Hollywood such a cesspit of abuse and misogyny?
But note that this is of a trend, of the left having second thoughts on what Claire Berlinski dubbed the “Warlock hunt” they’ve ginned up:
● Publicly, We Say #MeToo. Privately, We Have Misgivings.
● Senator Al Franken’s Resignation Is Deeply Unfair.
Pervnado began in 2016 with the since-deceased Roger Ailes being toppled from Fox, followed eventually by Bill O’Reilly, and NBC leaking the Trump pussy-grabbing tape to the Washington Post. At the time, the left and the news media (but I repeat myself) were happy to sit back and pass the popcorn, because they assumed this was simply a rightwing issue, and it served them in 2016 as battlefield prep for Hillary.
But the firings of the Fox News icons created a template: In his twitter thread in October on Harvey Weinstein’s career demise, Brian Cates wrote, “What took out Ailes/O’Reilly was so many women coming forward at once. The usual playbook of legal threats/buying them off didn’t work. Watching Ailes & then O’Reilly being suddenly toppled, it COULD be some women in Hollywood realized there was hope.”
Couple that with the left’s “we’re all victims” mentality, and as Richard Fernandez says, the Democrats’ torpedoes aimed at Trump and Fox News have circled back, bigly. As Jonah Goldberg once wrote:
Liberals are geniuses at unleashing social panics because A) it never occurs to them that their motives are anything but pure and B) because they are almost exclusively focused on short term tactics. And yet they are invariably shocked when these moral frenzies come back to bite them. McCarthyism was a direct consequence of both the Red Scare and the Brown Scare. And when the tactics they mastered were turned on them, they acted as if they came from nowhere.
As Kurt Schlichter tried to warn them, the left don’t seem to be enjoying living under the new rules they created. Particularly when the tactics they’ve mastered end up devouring too many of their own, and those who are left are likely too powerful to airbrush out of history.
QED: Bill Clinton, still doing Democratic fundraisers.
WELL, YES: “Studies tend to show that in terms of weight loss, diet plays a much bigger role than exercise.” Unless you have Michael Phelps’ workout schedule, it’s hard to exercise off the weight. But I find it’s much easier to stick to a diet when I exercise.
NEWS YOU CAN USE: Giving up booze for Dry January? Here’s some advice from the experts.
IN THE MAIL: The Gourmet Slow Cooker: Simple and Sophisticated Meals from Around the World.
Plus, fresh Gold Box and Lightning Deals.
HIGHER EDUCATION UPDATE: VIDEO: Professor tells students to violate U.S. laws, ‘destroy’ white democracy.
WELL, THAT’S BIG OF THEM: Community College Agrees to Allow Free Speech On Campus.
AT AMAZON, Hot New Releases, Updated Hourly.
Plus, new Kindle Daily Deals.
MORTAR IN ACTION: 501st Parachute Infantry regiment mortar fires in support of Afghan soldiers.
WEIRD, THAT: Why hasn’t Michael Wolff’s dementia-Trump ever been seen in public?
In the book, Trump has an impossibly short attention span, refuses to learn from policy briefs and fails to grasp the fundamentals of U.S. government.
Where was this version of Trump when giving one of his dozens of interviews, hosting his rallies, or delivering public remarks at any point between 2015 and now?
Yes, Trump mostly spoke extemporaneously during the campaign, often repeating words and themes, a phenomenon otherwise known as speaking aloud.
But he’s also delivered dozens of speeches off teleprompters, proving he can actually read, frequently going off-script to offer commentary and then returning to the prepared remarks.
During the campaign, from January to September in 2016, he hosted more than four-and-a-half hours worth of press conferences, compared to Hillary Clinton’s 38 minutes worth.
Here’s an experiment: Put a truly mentally slow older person, like Dana Milbank, for example, on stage in front of reporters to answer a succession of questions for one hour. Then compare it to the multiple times Trump did it, and see who comes out sharpest.
As president, Trump frequently approaches the press pool in order to answer a range of questions, something former President Obama rarely did.
In Wolff’s book, he says Trump is perpetually distracted, can’t train his mind on substance, and couldn’t recognize his own friends.
Contrast that account with the transcript of a 30-minute interview Trump gave at his golf club in Florida on Dec. 28 to the New York Times. It shows him talking at length about the Russia investigation, the threat from North Korea, and immigration. He even interrupts his thoughts to speak with guests he presumably recognizes.
You never see dementia-Trump in public because he only lives in the heads of Democrats and reporters — but I repeat myself — who are desperate to believe, and who are making fools of themselves in the process.
WELL, SOMEONE’S CRAZY HERE: “Yale psychiatrist who briefed Hill Dems wants to physically restrain President Trump, force him to submit to evaluation, declare him unfit for office. But she worries: ‘This really will look like a coup.’ You think?”
Related: How The Media Mainstreamed A Democratic Conspiracy Theory.
AT AMAZON, Alpine Swiss Mens Plaid Scarf Soft Winter Scarves.
Plus, Lightning Deal, Silicone Wedding Ring For Men By ROQ, 4 Pack.
A PROPER INTERPRETATION OF THE COMMERCE CLAUSE WOULD HAVE PREVENTED THIS: Blame the Supreme Court for Letting the Feds Target Legal State Pot: The awful precedents that helped empower Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
OUCH: “The FBI did everything but drive Hillary’s getaway car.”
Former secretary of state Clinton is a free woman largely thanks to the tender loving care that the FBI provided her and her conspirators during its probe of her illegal, unsecure email server and related abuse of government secrets. GOP lawmakers concluded this after grilling FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe on December 21, behind closed doors, according to John Solomon’s molar-grinding expose in Tuesday’s The Hill.
“For the first time, investigators say they have secured written evidence that the FBI believed there was evidence that some laws were broken,” Solomon reported. This proof includes what Solomon calls revelations of “irregularities and contradictions” in the FBI’s inquiry.
Former FBI director James Comey’s first draft of his statement exonerating Hillary Clinton was dated May 2, 2016. But FBI agents on this case still were collecting subpoenaed documents and other relevant evidence. They cataloged additional exhibits on May 13, 19, and 26. . . .
“You have a conference call with Secretary Clinton’s attorneys on March 31, 2015, and on that very same day her emails are deleted by someone who was on that conference call using special BleachBit software,” Senate Judiciary Chairman Charles Grassley (R., Iowa) said on the Senate floor. “The emails were State Department records under subpoena by Congress,” as of that March 25.
“What did the FBI do to investigate this apparent obstruction?” Grassley wondered. “According to affidavits filed in federal court — absolutely nothing.”
Read the whole thing.
IT’S ALMOST LIKE TRUMP KNOWS WHAT HE’S DOING: Tapes Reveal Egyptian Leaders’ Tacit Acceptance of Jerusalem Move.
NEWS YOU CAN USE: Visual Guide to Lock Picking.
YOU’VE BEEN WAITING FOR IT ALL DAY: Here’s your open thread. Talk about what you want!
OVERLOOKED: New tax law is a huge win for renters. “For over a century, the federal tax code catered to homeowners and treated renters like second-class citizens. Homeowners have been able to deduct interest on their mortgages, home-equity loans and property taxes. Meanwhile, everyone — including renters — footed the bill for these deductions by paying higher rates. The new tax law at last begins leveling the playing field between renters and homeowners.”
Plus: “Democrats are usually eager to slap taxes on millionaires. But now, they’re so desperate to discredit GOP tax reform that they’re defending deductions for the nation’s wealthiest homeowners in expensive East and West coast enclaves.”
HOW SEVERE COLD affects your car, and what to do about it. It’s good to have one of these jump starter/air compressor combinations to deal with a lot of the problems.
NO ONE’S CRUELER THAN A LEFTY WHO’S NOT GETTING HIS WAY: The Torment of Ajit Pai. Except maybe a lefty who gets his way.
ISN’T IT WEIRD, THOUGH? President Trump’s Twitter-fueled foreign policy: Not as bad as you might think.. “Yes, Trump himself is a maverick and populist. By virtue of his style and temperament, he has complicated U.S. diplomacy, and lowered America’s standing in the world at least temporarily. And yes, 2018 could bring momentous White House decisions on issues like North Korea and Iran that may invalidate this analysis going forward. But largely because of the strength and coherence of the foreign policy team that Trump assembled, 2017 in fact witnessed a far less dramatic departure in American foreign policy than has often been alleged.” And this from people who think withdrawing from the Paris Climate Accord was a debacle.