Archive for 2019

FIRE’S 2020 SPEECH CODE RATINGS OUT TODAY: Of the 471 rated colleges across the country, 89% still have red- or yellow-light ratings for having written policies that censor speech, which is outrageous. But for the very first time, more than 10% have green lights. (OK, 11%, but hey, it’s more than 10!) Odds are good your alma mater is in the ratings. How’d it do?

WHAT DO YOU CALL A CANDIDATE POOL WITH TWO WOMEN, A GAY MAN, A JEW, A HALF JEW, AND A CATHOLIC?: If you’ve drank a certain type of Kool-Aid, you call this “not diverse”–even though there has been only one Catholic president, and no gay, Jewish, or woman presidents. The obsession with arbitrary and artificial “official” minority status may be the single worse feature of the modern chattering classes.

UPDATE (FROM GLENN): On the other hand, if all the candidates were black, we’d be hearing how diverse the Democratic field is!

CHANGE: Google Co-Founders Page, Brin Give Up Management Roles.

Although still closely identified with the company, the co-founders have been a dwindling visible presence inside the Mountain View, Calif., campus for years, current and former employees say.

Google faces an unusually fierce collection of threats this year. Competitors like Amazon.com Inc. are chipping at its online-advertising business, while state and federal regulators are beginning broad investigations of purported anticompetitive behavior. Google has pledged to cooperate with the inquiries.

“While it has been a tremendous privilege to be deeply involved in the day-to-day management of the company for so long, we believe it’s time to assume the role of proud parents,” Messrs. Page and Brin wrote in the letter. “We plan to continue talking with Sundar regularly, especially on topics we’re passionate about.”

Maybe we could mark the occasion than with an antitrust investigation.

ANGELO CODEVILLA: A Deplorable Strategy Beyond 2020. “In 2016 and since, we have learned that our ruling class has amassed the power and developed the taste to revel in making us miserable. We have also learned that to avoid this, we must undo or separate ourselves from them, their structures, and priorities.”

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEF: Will the Real Kamala Harris Please Step Down. “Because the Democrats have to look at everything through the prism of diversity politics, there will probably no one among them that does a sober, realistic post mortem about Harris’s failure.”

SURFING CAMP PENDLETON: Did the The Beach Boys cover this in Surfin’ USA? Not perzackly. But this is a case of surfing southern California for the USA. Marines are kinda sorta heavily armed beach boys. In the photo a U.S. Navy LCAC transports 11th MEU personnel and equipment to Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, California.

JUSTICE: Who Quashed the Prosecution of The Leftists Who Poisoned Robert Spencer? “Reviewing the results of the investigation, Assistant Prosecutor Kjartan Ólafsson wrote a letter dated August 25, 2017 to the District Public Prosecutor, saying that in light of the recordings of the security camera and other things brought forward in the investigation that this was a criminal case that should be brought to court, because there was a likelihood of conviction against Sindri Geirsson and Sigurður Ólason. In his letter, he says: ‘The accused in the case are suspected of having poisoned Robert Bruce Spencer with narcotics by putting a combination of amphetamine and MDMA into his drink.’ . . . The Assistant Prosecutor concludes: ‘In light of all this and given the evidence of the case, especially the recordings of the security cameras, I think this case if brought to court would likely result in a guilty verdict.'”

INFRASTRUCTURE: Paul Bedard: Rural areas set to win big under Trump’s transportation plan for road, rail, and air.

After years of “discrimination” by Washington bureaucrats, rural communities are finally set to get a long-overdue share of federal money for roads, rail, and airports, a key promise of President Trump.

In a major funding shift championed by Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, officials have revealed that rural areas that received 21% of $7-$8 billion in infrastructure funds in past years received up to 70% in an early campaign to improve transportation safety and capacity and will get half from now on.

“Rural America is not looking for a handout … They merely want not to be overlooked or discriminated against and to have their fair share in the distribution of federal resources,” Chao told us about her new program, Rural Opportunities to Use Transportation for Economic Success, or ROUTES.

In the less than two months after Chao first talked about it in St. Louis, ROUTES has been embraced by transportation officials around the country as a boost to help increase safety and move goods through small towns.

Good.