IT’S COME TO THIS: David Brooks of the New York Times decries elitism.

The authors of [the Green New Deal] fantasy are right that we need to do something about global warming and inequality. But simple attempts to realign incentives, like the carbon tax, would be more effective and more realistic than government efforts to reorganize vast industries.

In an alienated America, efforts to decentralize power are more effective and realistic than efforts to concentrate it in the Washington elite. The great paradox of progressive populism is that it leads to elitism in its purist form.

The impulse to create a highly centralized superstate recurs throughout American history. There were people writing such grand master plans in the 1880s, the 1910s, the 1930s. They never work out. As Richard Weaver once put it, the problem with the next generation is that it hasn’t read the minutes of the last meeting.

But I’m sure Brooks would agree that they really know what they’re doing when it comes to sharpening their trouser creases.

ESTABLISHING THE NARRATIVE: Trump ‘Not Happy’ With Border Security Agreement, Says Another Shutdown Would Be Dems’ Fault. “They are hurting our country very badly.”

IT’S AS IF THE WHOLE THING IS JUST A SCAM: Green New Deal’s 55 promises that have little to do with climate change: The full list.

Plus: “Claiming to solve one giant mess of a global problem like climate change with a revolutionary plan for change that doesn’t take into account basic economics, civil rights and democracy is dishonest. Claiming to be able to solve that problem and every other problem you can think of at the same time is certifiable.”

AH FLORIDA WOMAN, NEVER CHANGE:  Woman accused of forcing teens to prostitute themselves on app.

AT LONG LAST OUR NATIONAL NIGHTMARE IS OVER; MARVEL CINEMA UNIVERSE GETS WOKE:  Brie Larson isn’t letting ‘Captain Marvel’ press tour be ‘overwhelmingly’ white and male.

IT WAS A NEOLITHIC RED LIGHT DISTRICT:  Prehistoric sailors may be responsible for Stonehenge.

SHOCKED, SHOCKED:  California’s Gov. Newsom misses budget by $2 billion in January.

(DRILY) YES. IT WILL SAVE SOUTH AFRICA AS MUCH AS THE OIL RESERVES SAVED VENEZUELA:  Massive oil and gas reserves found off South African coast a ‘game-changer’.

THEY REALLY DON’T LIKE MIRRORS:  Fake News: If the Shoe Fits, Wear It.

UM…  Trump reacts to border deal.

OH, DEAR, DEAR LORD:  “Agreement in Principle:” Congress Critters Reach Border Security Funding Accord.

AND TRUMP IS RIGHT:  Trump Says ‘Anti-Semitism Has No Place In Congress’ And Ilhan Omar Should Resign.

OH DEAR LORD:  A Call to Unionize Exposes the Art World’s Sense of Entitlement.

DEMOCRATS IN DISARRAY: Extremism, Scandals Rip Apart Democrat Party: Radicalism, Racism, Anti-Semitism, Sexism, Socialism Threaten Left’s Return to Power.

YEAH, IT’S CRAZY THAT A MAGAZINE WITH A NAME LIKE ESQUIRE WOULD PAY ATTENTION TO STRAIGHT, WHITE MALES.* NEXT, MS. FOCUSES ON WOMEN.

But it’s easy to understand why the left’s culture of hate-filled narcissism would have problems with it.

*Okay, actually with today’s SJW-sodden Esquire, it is kind of surprising.

LIFE UNDER LATE SOCIALISM: Venezuelan professional women working as prostitutes to feed their families.

TROLL LEVEL: COCAINE MITCH. Mitch McConnell is going to force the Senate to vote on Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal. “I’ve noted with great interest the Green New Deal, and we’re going to be voting on that in the Senate to give everybody an opportunity to go on record.”

Meanwhile, even David Brooks is getting snarky with AOC: “But the underlying faith of the Green New Deal is a faith in the guiding wisdom of the political elite. The authors of the Green New Deal assume that technocratic planners can master the movements of 328 million Americans and design a transportation system so that ‘air travel stops becoming necessary.’ (This is from people who couldn’t even organize the successful release of their own background document.)” Oh, snap!

UPDATE: Heh.

OPEN THREAD: It’s almost Hump Day.

HMM: The Case For Transmissible Alzheimer’s Grows.

It is important – imperative – to emphasize that transmissible does not equal contagious. There is absolutely no evidence that people with dementia can spread their disease casually to people around them. Even donated blood appears to be safe, as no association with blood transfusions and Alzheimer’s Disease has ever been detected.

Rather, in the course of some neurological surgeries – and perhaps certain kinds of medical exams – prions may become lodged on equipment. And there is a chance this equipment could transmit the disease. Organ donation protocols may also warrant some review. It was already known that donations of dura mater, a tough brain covering, have transmitted Aβ to young people in the past.

And I wonder. Since Alzheimer’s Disease is so common, and we have not (to my knowledge) been looking for Alzheimer’s caused by surgical or other medical procedures that access eye or neural tissue — particularly in patients for whom the appearance of Alzheimer’s would not be surprising — is it possible that we are underestimating the transmission potential of this disease, and that such events are less rare than we would guess?

I don’t know, but I don’t like it.

TRY THE VEAL, IT’S HERE ALL WEEK: We can now redefine what it means to get an “Amazon package.” 

Just a few days ago The Official Newspaper of The Resistance was tossing out bait for every gullible reporter that the photos were obtained by “a government source”, possibly the Saudis.

I don’t think the Saudis would let Bezos’ girlfriend (or any woman, for that matter) dress in public like this.

WHAT EVERYONE NEEDS: Alpaca Yoga.

AT AMAZON, save on Office Supplies.

Plus, deals on bestselling Tools and Hardware.

MY USA TODAY COLUMN: Fight The Power: Higher education discriminates against men, but Title IX complaints may change that.

MEGAN MCARDLE WRITES, ‘WE’RE NUTS!’ ISN’T A GREAT PITCH FOR A GREEN NEW DEAL:

Going by my experience at energy-efficiencizing, I’d estimate that the Ocasio-Cortez plan would require the entire population of the United States — or at least those who aren’t “unwilling to work” — to drop whatever they’re doing and start training to become insulation installers, HVAC technicians, electricians, automotive engineers or demolition experts. But even a quarter of that effort doesn’t really seem very practical. Nor politically enticing. The only historical operation even approaching such scale was the U.S. mobilization for World War II, and unfortunately for Green New Dealers, the coal industry probably won’t cooperate by bombing Pearl Harbor.

This is ordinarily the time I’d add a snarky Allahpundit-inspired “what could go wrong” rejoinder. However, Australia’s pioneering blogger Tim Blair can answer that one: the Green New Deal: A Cautionary Tale.

At the Daily Telegraph, where I work, we discovered something was amiss when our chief of staff ordered a pizza. To her surprise, the delivery man also offered an insulation quote.

There were only 250 registered insulation businesses in Australia when the package was announced. That number quickly blew out to 7,000 because the government was handing out free money to installers. Pizza drivers could pick up more in one insulation job than from a month’s worth of tips. They received their rebates directly from the government rather than from homeowners, who therefore had little incentive to check if the work had been done well or even at all. Some ceilings ended up with a mere handful of insulation batts thrown around. Others featured only shredded paper. Almost every insulation job went right up to the $1,600 cap, regardless of size or ceiling area.

The insulation army worked at frantic speed, eager to cash in while they could. When the difference between five jobs done reasonably well and eight jobs done in careless haste is $4,800, a short amount of time represents a lot of money.

Then the deaths began. Four young men were killed while installing insulation under the government’s program—three by electrocution and one from hyperthermia during the Australian summer. Dozens more workers, most of them inexperienced, suffered injuries and heat stroke.

Read on for a cameo from Peter Garrett, the former lead singer from MTV mid-’80s darlings Midnight Oil, who discovered the hard way how prescient his 1987 hit “Beds are Burning” was.