THE COMEY EFFECT HAS BEEN GREATLY EXAGGERATED: It seems to have become an article of faith among Democrats and progressives, even statistically-oriented ones like Nate Silver, that the Comey letter on Clinton’s emails, released on October 29, 2016, swung the election to Trump. Given how close the election was, almost any minor event could have swung the election. But the evidence that the letter had a significant effect, e.g., swinging the popular vote by 3 or 4 points isn’t there. Consider my Facebook post from Monday, October 30, 2016:

SUSTAINABILITY: CBO Director Says Debt to Soar Past Postwar Levels at Current Trajectory. “Projected at 150 percent of GDP by 2049, and ‘even at its highest point ever even after World War II debt was far less than that at 106 percent of GDP”.”

The difference between World War II and an entitlement program? WWII had an end.

UPDATE (FROM GLENN): Flashback: Why Guns Are Better Than Butter.

A FAKE “GRASSROOTS” ANTI-GUN PROTEST? GO FIGURE. Docs Reveal Portland School Administrators Planned & Paid for ‘Student’ Anti-Gun Protest.

LIZ SHELD’S MORNING BRIEF: Howard Schultz vs. AOC.

Just click on through for the Dem 2020 candidate roundup.

IN DEFENSE OF ASSIMILATION: As Rich Lowry writes, Tom Brokaw “didn’t understand that assimilation is now a third rail of American politics.”

He caused a furor with comments on the venerable Sunday news program Meet the Press over the weekend, including, most controversially, his statement that he believes “that the Hispanics should work harder at assimilation.”

The condemnations were swift and sweeping and a sign that being a beloved media figure who has never before said anything that could legitimately be considered bigoted is no defense when the furies descend.

It was Presidential Medal of Freedom to white hood in one sound bite. A group called Latino Victory hit Brokaw for allegedly giving “credence to white supremacist ideology.”

Typically, his apologies were deemed insufficient and part and parcel of the original offense.

Let’s stipulate that using a definite article to refer to any minority group will always strike people as tone-deaf, but what Brokaw was getting at — the importance of assimilation to cultural cohesion — should be uncontroversial.

It isn’t anymore. The head of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists rejected the very idea of assimilation, which he decried as “denying one culture for the other.” It is astonishing that in that formulation “the other” is American culture. We are perhaps the only nation in world history that has sought to “otherize” its own culture.

Read the whole thing. Naturally of course, in order to appease his fellow leftists, Brokaw didn’t dare stand his ground on Twitter, eventually either reverting to the mindset of a 15 year old, or more likely, having a young ghost-tweeter play the role of flak catcher:

Lowry doesn’t go on to note what Brokaw was given a near-complete pass for on Sunday: Tom Brokaw Claims GOPers Tell Him They’re Not Fans of ‘Brown Grandbabies.’

But if that actually happened, why doesn’t he name any names? Why would Brokaw cover for racists?

TOM HARRIS AND DR. TIM BALL: Record Cold Forces Rethink on Global Warming. “The recent weather is a stark reminder that a colder world is a much greater threat than a warmer one. While governments plan for warming, all the indications are that the world is cooling. And, contrary to the proclamations of climate activists, every single year more people die from the cold than from the heat.”

You don’t want to live in a John Ringo novel, but you do want to read all of what Harris and Ball have to say.

FLASHBACK: Climate Change Made Simple.

BOLTON’S NOTEPAD AND AMERICA’S VENEZUELAN POLICY COCKTAIL.

IT’S NOT THAT THEY DON’T CARE ABOUT STUDENTS, IT’S JUST THAT THEY ONLY CARE ABOUT SOME STUDENTS, AND THESE WEREN’T THE ONES: Professor blasts university for playing down violent threat against conservative students’ event.

MINISTRY OF LOVE: Deaths mount as U.S. ups pressure on Venezuela’s Maduro.

The U.N. human rights office has said security forces in Venezuela detained nearly 700 people in one day last week amid anti-government protests — the highest such tally in a single day in the country in at least 20 years. Rights office spokesman Rupert Colville said Tuesday that 696 people were detained on Wednesday alone. Overall, some 850 were detained between Monday and Saturday, including 77 children.

Colville said “more than 40 people” were believed to have been in killed “in different manners” amid the recent protests, including 11 people reportedly killed by “unidentified individuals” linked to incidents of looting. He said one member of the Bolivarian Guard was reportedly killed in the state of Monagas.

If you’re opposed to socialism, it’s because you don’t care about people.

“A GROWING MOVEMENT TO WUSSIFY STUDENTS:” GWU prof slams sororities offering ‘snowflake’ students coloring books, stress balls to ‘decompress:’ He said the ‘coddling’ of students is likely to result in ‘wimpy’ lawyers.

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HMM: Report: Trump can build wall without declaring emergency. “A new report by the CRS not only suggests that the president could obtain funding for his wall by declaring an emergency or by using other existing statutory authority, it provides a virtual road map.” The CRS, otherwise known as the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service.

And after all the scaremongering talk about an emergency, any other way he does it will look reasonable by comparison.

Related: Shock poll: Democratic swing districts back wall, Trump immigration offer.

Also: Poll: Trump voters will mutiny if the wall isn’t built, faces 43 percent drop in support.

Gee, I wonder what he will do?

OLD NEWS: Roger Stone raid shows that CNN is no longer covering Robert Mueller. They’re working with him.

JOURNALISM: After getting pushback from Sen. Kamala Harris’s (D-CA) campaign, CNN’s Andrew Kaczynski on Tuesday evening deleted an accurate tweet about how Harris backtracked on her call to “eliminate” private health insurance and provide Medicare for all.

Well, if a Democrat’s campaign doesn’t like what you write, of course you take it down. After all,

BYRON YORK: In border talks, a new fight for barrier deniers.

THINK OF THE MEDIA AS DEMOCRATIC OPERATIVES WITH BYLINES AND YOU WON’T GO FAR WRONG: Ocasio-Cortez’s Media Attacks Are Constructive Criticism, Trump’s a Dire Attack on Our Democracy.

TO THROW ROCKS, OF COURSE: Why America Needs a Presence on the Moon.

If fuel can be made from frozen water at the Moon’s poles and then moved into low, medium or geosynchronous earth orbits, everything changes. Satellites can be refueled in space, requiring smaller rockets to place them into orbit. Routine travel to the Moon from a space station becomes practical. Missions to Mars become affordable. Most importantly, it may become economically viable to mine near-earth asteroids, potentially unlocking literally quintillions in resources, an economic bounty unmatched in human history.

The key terrain at these polar locations is incredibly small. While the lunar North Pole has some water, most is located at its South Pole in deep craters free from sunlight. To make fuel, processing equipment must be installed on two or three crater tops exposed to the sun, the largest of which is only a few football fields wide. Thus, these crater tops may become the solar system’s most exclusive addresses.

If the Moon does open to fuel production, several other points become strategically important.

Nothing terribly new here for space nerds, but a good read nonetheless.

(Classical reference in the headline.)

2017 FLASHBACK: Why aren’t bills on infrastructure, tax reform and free speech lined up like planes on a runway? Well, we got the tax cuts, but there were lots of missed opportunities. Or maybe more like deliberately foregone opportunities under a GOP Congressional leadership, especially in the House, that didn’t seem to want to accomplish much of anything.

FLASHBACK: “Venezuela was once one of Latin America’s richest countries, flush with oil wealth that attracted immigrants from places as varied as Europe and the Middle East.”

THIS WILL ONLY BOLSTER HER DEMOCRATIC CRED: Linda Sarsour Outs Herself as an Anti-Semite on Holocaust Remembrance Day. “Her 2019 statement fits her 2017 ‘definition of anti-Semitism’.”

WEIRD: Why the Illinois exodus? The rich get bashed, and off they go. “Like thousands of others, I tired of the one-party system, rising pension debt, no change to the current pension system, increasing property taxes (mine doubled), increasing crime and soft approach to criminals.”

Related: If you tax them, they will go. Especially if you bash them, too.

SHOCKER: Kamala Harris Sounds A Lot Like An Authoritarian. “Some Democrats are trying to recast their soft authoritarianism as a patriotic endeavor. Don’t let them get away with it.” It’s not that soft, and they’re not that patriotic.

POPCORN: Ocasio-Cortez could face a primary challenge in 2020 as frustrated Democrats begin to whisper about torpedoing firebrand who is working to replace them with progressives. “You’ve got numerous council people and state legislators who’ve been waiting 20 years for that seat. I’m sure they can find numerous people who want that seat in that district.”

Plus: “Sparking the anger was a report from Politico that Ocasio-Cortez and a grassroots group with close ties to her, Justice Democrats, were considering backing a primary challenge to fellow New York Democrat Hakeem Jeffries, among other lawmakers.”