MARK PULLIAM: The Texas Law Review joins The Resistance.

Several features of the symposium lead me to question its neutrality. First, the panelists include the “usual suspects” of progressive activism, including UC Berkeley Erwin Chemerinsky, Harvard law professor Mark Tushnet (discussed here), and UT’s own Steve Vladeck. The “center-right” panelists include NeverTrumpers Ilya Somin and Jonathan Adler, both signatories to the “Originalists Against Trump” statement prior to the 2016 election. The panels lack balance, as one might suspect from the ACS sponsorship.

More troubling is the selection of the opening keynote speaker, Sally Q. Yates. Yates’ claim to fame, aside from being a deputy AG in President Obama’s DOJ, serving under Eric Holder and Loretta Lynch, is that for 10 short days she was “acting” AG under President Trump as a holdover appointment. She was fired when she refused to defend the President’s “travel ban” order, which was ultimately upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court. Yates was a partisan who was properly dismissed for insubordination, yet her selection as keynote speaker obviously attempts to portray her as a heroine or even a martyr.

Rule of Law.

ELSEWHERE IN NEWS OF DEMOCRATIC PARTY RACISM: Farrakhan Says God Wants Black People To Have Their Own State.

THIS SOUNDS PRETTY GOOD, ACTUALLY: Cajun Queso.

THE LEFT TURNED INTO THE MORAL MAJORITY SO SLOWLY, I HARDLY EVEN NOTICED: Why Is There A War On NFL Cheerleaders?

As if the left hasn’t ruined football enough already.

AND AGAIN: Twitter once again suspends Jim Treacher. You can read the details from his backup account, which uses his real name:

Just got an e-mail from Twitter Support. Iundefinedm suspended for this. People are spreading a lie about Mike Pence, and I pointed out that it was a lie. So now I’m suspended. pic.twitter.com/dteI9SCcRs

— Sean Medlock (@Sean_Medlock) February 2, 2019

I’M EXPECTING AN EARTH-SHATTERING KABOOM: NASA to test new weapon against asteroids.

A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS: “Standing up for himself, the governor is a man alone. It takes a certain crazy willfulness for him to defy the mob when he has become such an inconvenience to his party’s vested interest in deploying the race card at will. Northam’s fellow Democrats badly want him to disappear. So long as his memory remains cloudy and the evidence remains less than conclusive, they deserve his continued tenure in office. He fairly represents the (black)face of the Democratic Party,” Scott Johnson writes at Power Line.

Via PJM, a (likely partial) list — from MSNBC, astonishingly enough — of those who have been calling for Northam’s resignation:

And as Paula Bolyard writes at PJM, “Northam confessing to the Michael Jackson episode, where he ‘blackened’ his face for some kind of dance contest, is… interesting. The only way Northam cops to that now is if he knows there’s a photo or video floating around out there somewhere.”

How crazy was Northam’s press conference? “Video of when Ralph Northam gets asked by a reporter if he can still moonwalk. He looks around as if for space – only to be cut off by his wife who says, ‘inappropriate circumstances.'”

UNEXPECTEDLY: CBS rejects pro-flag, anti-Kaepernick ‘Just Stand’ Super Bowl ad.

Earlier: The Left Ruined the Oscars and Super Bowl. What’s Next?

LOTS ABOUT KNOTS. There’s no math, but if you want some, here’s Knot Theory. Just in case you were Jonesing for polynomials.

UPDATE: Okay, it wasn’t as good as the Fermat joke, but I thought “Jonesing for polynomials” was pretty good.

THE MAN IN THE MIRROR. Northam Refuses to Resign: I Am Not in Photo, But I ‘Darkened My Face’ for Michael Jackson Costume at Dance Contest.

More here: “The surreal press conference was packed with twists: Northam provided a wild non-explanation for how the photo ended up on his page. He confessed to ‘darkening’ his face for the Texas dance contest. He gave a half-assed explanation of why his yearbook nickname was ‘Coonman.’ Later, when asked about the dance contest, he said he won because he learned how to moonwalk. He then made a joke about how hard it is to remove shoe polish from his face — but denied that qualified as blackface.”

Regarding that “half-assed explanation” of “Coonman,” Northam claimed, “My main nickname was Goose, because when my voice would change, it would change an octave. There were two individuals, as best I recollect. They were a year ahead of me, they called me — I don’t know their motives or intent. I know who they are. That was the extent of it. This ended up in the yearbook and I regret that.”

And we’ve entered the bargaining stage of Kubler-Ross: “‘I could spare myself from the difficult path that lies ahead. I could avoid an honest conversation about harmful actions from my past,’ he said. ‘I cannot in good conscience chose the path that would be easier for me in an effort to duck my responsibility to reconcile.’”

UPDATE: “‘My main nickname in high school and in college was ‘Goose.’ There were two individuals at VMI. They called me ‘Coonman.’ I regret that’ Ralph Northam says. How can you regret a nickname that you didn’t choose?”, Tyler O’Neil asks at the PJM Mothership, which is liveblogging the Northam fiasco.

ANOTHER UPDATE (FROM GLENN): This sounds plausible:

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#FEMALEPRIVILEGE: Woman who offered sex to 13-year-old ‘boy’ for £10 to buy heroin spared jail.

VISCERAL FAT: Fat inside body worse for health, study says.

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NORTHAM NOW IN THE DENIAL PHASE OF THE KUBLER-ROSS MODEL. Report: Northam now not sure it’s him in the photo, wants to use facial recognition software:

This will be a lingering headache for Democrats if he doesn’t quit, as the media will now track down the med school’s old yearbook editors and try to find out how photos were chosen. There’s nothing in the state’s impeachment statute either that would justify removing him from office to stop the bleeding. The story will drag on, with Northam destined to resign anyway as pressure from the party keeps up. WaPo has already reached out to some of his old med-school classmates to ask about the yearbook, in fact. An interesting detail:

Joan Naidorf, whose husband’s yearbook page is opposite Northam’s in the yearbook, said she was surprised the photos are only now coming out, given Northam’s stature in Virginia politics.

“We’ve often wondered over the last 10 years or so why someone didn’t dig this up sooner,” said Naidorf, a nonpracticing emergency room physician who lives in Alexandria…

Eastern Virginia Medical School allowed students to pick their own photos for their yearbook page, Naidorf said. Her husband chose their engagement photo and other personal pictures. Another student chose a picture of men in blackface and dressed as women in what appears to be a variety-show routine.

Gonna be tough for Northam to claim he had nothing to do with the photo selection. He’d be better off pointing to that “variety show” as the culprit. “Okay, yes, I’m probably in the photo, but it’s not what it seems. It was part of a performance, a skit making fun of racists that was in bad taste in hindsight. I’m sorry.” It won’t save his job but it might save his social circle for him.

As Allahpundit deadpans, “Killing babies on the table is one thing, but an old blackface photo is where America draws the line.”

THINK OF THE PRESS AS DEMOCRATIC OPERATIVES WITH BYLINES AND IT ALL MAKES SENSE: