HISTORY: That time Joe Biden voted to restore Robert E. Lee’s citizenship. “So as the debate continues, how exactly do Biden and the Democrats plan on playing this one? (By the way, Patrick Leahy was there for the Lee citizenship vote too.) I believe that the Democrats have already established under the new rules of play that you’re not allowed to say ‘that was another time,’ or ‘that was then and this is now.’ There is no statute of limitations on doing anything insensitive on the civil rights front. So with that in mind, Biden has to stand against the wheel and account for that vote, right? Sounds like something that would be totally disqualifying if he had an R after his name. But this is the primary season and plenty of young Democrats are trying to nab the nomination for themselves. Would any of them be so rude and discourteous as to bring up Biden’s vote on General Lee?”

POOR BALTIMORE: Baltimore job training center raided by feds has gotten hundreds of thousands in grants, is run by convicted thief.

THE RETURN OF THE PRIMITIVE: PG&E’s Radical Plan to Prevent Wildfires: Shut Down the Power Grid. “When dangerously high winds arise this year, the utility says it will black out fire-prone areas that are home to 5.4 million people.”

No U.S. utility has ever blacked out so many people on purpose. PG&E says it could knock out power to as much as an eighth of the state’s population for as long as five days when dangerously high winds arise. Communities likely to get shut off worry PG&E will put people in danger, especially the sick and elderly, and cause financial losses with slim hope of compensation.

In October, in a test run of sorts, PG&E for the first time cut power to several small communities over wildfire concerns, including the small Napa Valley town of Calistoga, for about two days. Emergency officials raced door-to-door to check on elderly residents, some of whom relied on electric medical devices. Grocers dumped spoiling inventory. Hotels lost business.

PG&E is “essentially shifting all of the burden, all of the losses onto everyone else,” said Dylan Feik, who was Calistoga city manager until earlier this month.

I’d ask the last conservative to leave California to turn off the lights, but they probably already will be.

IF YOU HAVEN’T DONE IT YET, CHECK OUT ISSUES AND INSIGHTS, from the former Investor’s Business Daily folks. It’s worth your time.

GREAT AGAIN: Trump’s strong economy troubles Democrats trying to reach out to middle class.

YES. The Mueller Report Indicts the Trump-Russia Conspiracy Theory. “In the end, Mueller’s report shows that the Trump-Russia collusion narrative embraced and evangelized by the US political and media establishments to be a work of fiction. The American public was presented with a far different picture from what was expected, because leading pundits, outlets, and politicians ignored the countervailing facts and promoted maximalist interpretations of others. Anonymous officials also leaked explosive yet uncorroborated claims, leaving behind many stories that were subsequently discredited, retracted, or remain unconfirmed to this day.”

Kudos to The Nation for publishing this.

OF COURSE THEY DO: 2020 Dems Condemn “Gun Violence” Instead of Anti-Semitism After Synagogue Attack.

TREY GOWDY: Dem Presidential Hopeful Eric Swalwell ‘Ought to Scare the Ever-Living Hell Out of You.’

THE RETRACTION THE NEW YORK TIMES SHOULD HAVE WRITTEN:

‘We ran a blatantly anti-Semitic cartoon. At a time when anti-Jewish violence and incitement is at levels not seen since 1945, we chose to place gutter racism on our pages. We did this because plenty of our editors share the prejudice of this cartoon; if in doubt, look at our unsigned editorials.

‘We’re so soaked in this that none of us thought that it might be an error to publish a cartoon with clear precursors in fascist, communist, Arab nationalist and Islamist propaganda. Rather than explain this away in the passive tense, we’re going to name the editors who signed off on this cartoon, and fire them.’

“Of course, the Times will do none of this. There won’t be a comparative demonstration of why this kind of imagery is so obnoxious, because the Times is histrionically sensitive to giving offense to any group except the groups that it identifies as objects of contempt: Republicans, white Southerners, Easter worshippers, people who like Brexit, and ‘Zionists’, a euphemism which one recent survey counted as 92 percent of American Jews. Nor will there be any kind of acknowledgment that the publication of this cartoon reflects the unexamined moral rot of the left in Europe and the United States, in which anti-Semitism and conspiracy theories, whether about Jews or Russian ‘collusion’, play so central a role.”

JOEL KOTKIN: The Media Have Already Lost The Election.

It’s far too early to predict which party will win next year’s election, but not too early to announce the national media as a clear loser in terms of national influence and prestige.

Pew reports that millennials have become as negative about major media as older generations, with their rate of approval dropping from 40% in 2010 to 27% today. Gallup tracks a similar pattern, finding 70% losing trust in the media, including nearly half of Democrats.

As Trump backers never cease to point out, the Mueller report undermined the supposedly rock solid case for “collusion.” Whatever the truth, a solid majority of Americans believe the Russiagate brouhaha was politically motivated. Some progressives, like Rolling Stone’s contributing editor Matt Taibbi, believe Mueller represents “a death-blow for the reputation of the American news media.”

Ironically, Trump, the man the media wanted to bring down, was largely their creation. At a party in 2016, my wife and I were regaled by a CNN account executive crowing about the company’s strategy of using Trump rallies, at the exclusion of others, to boost ratings. Once having created President Frankenstein, CNN then tried to keep up the ratings by chronicling his disposal — this worked for MSNBC which, unlike CNN, never much pretended to be an objective network. Today, CNN’s audience share has fallen below not only leader Fox, but MSNBC, Home and Garden, Discovery and Food networks.

Get woke, go broke.

IT’S COME TO THIS: Secular universities now demand a ‘profession of faith.’

DO YOU KNOW WHAT TROUBLES WRITERS FOR THE BABYLON BEE? THEY LAY AWAKE NIGHTS, WORRIED THAT THEIR HILARIOUS HEADLINE WILL BE TRUE BEFORE IT APPEARS ON THE WEBSITE:  Amid Criticism That He’s Too White, Biden Insists He Has A Black Friend.

I don’t envy them!

I DON’T KNOW WHY SO MANY OF MY FRIENDS ARE SO INTERESTED IN GETTING TO WHERE FALLING FROM WOULD KILL THEM BUT THERE IT IS:  Armstrong Starters and Other Old Things.

THEY HAVE NOTHING BUT A CULT LIKE LOYALTY TO THE DREAM THAT FAILED:  Universities now requiring loyalty oaths taken to ‘diversity’.

AS BAD AS THE CORRESPONDENT’S REPORTAGE:  How bad was that White House Correspondents Dinner Trump refused to attend?

HAVING FOUND A CACHE OF THE EXTREMELY GULLIBLE:  Campaign Violation: AOC Dupes Green New Deal ‘Fun Run’ Participants.

I HAVE A T-SHIRT THAT SAYS NO NOOK SNEK!  (I HAVE NO CLUE WHO SENT IT TO ME. I HAVE TO LEARN NOT TO SEE SOMETHING SOMEONE POSTED AND SAY “OOOH. I WANT ONE.” IT LEADS TO THE STRANGEST COLLECTION OF GIFTS EVER, RANGING FROM T-SHIRTS TO NERF GUNS.): Swalwell to America: We Will Disarm You; America: *Raises Middle Finger Salute*.

Also: Molon labe. These are my middle fingers.  Behold a matched pair.

AND AGAIN WITH THE SHOCKED FACE, SHOCKED:  Historian Ron Chernow Gets Jefferson And Hamilton History Wrong At #WHCD.