IN THE EMAIL FROM PATRICK CHILES:  Frozen Orbit.

THE BEGINNING OF LIFE AWAITS AT THE END OF THE SOLAR SYSTEM.

A FROZEN ANSWER AT THE EDGE OF PLANETARY SPACE

Set to embark on NASA’s first expedition to the outer planets, the crew of the spacecraft Magellan learns someone else has beaten them by a few decades: a top-secret Soviet project codenamed Arkangel.

Now during their long race to the Kuiper Belt, astronauts Jack Templeton and Traci Keene must unwind a decades-old mystery buried in the pages of a dead cosmonaut’s journal. The solution will challenge their beliefs about the nature of humanity, and will force the astronauts to confront the question of existence itself. And the final answer lies at the edge of the Solar System, waiting to change everything.

AND RELATED TO THAT LAST ITEM:  De-Worse It Gets.

NOT TO MENTION A HUGE IDIOT — THE WOKE DON’T BUY BOOKS! AND HONESTLY ARE A TINY AND NOISY RUMP OF THE REAL POPULATION — AND ABSOLUTELY AND ABJECTLY IRRATIONAL. MR. KING, NOTE THAT MAKING SURE THAT THERE ARE MINORITIES BY THE NUMBERS IN AWARDS SUPPOSED TO BE GIVEN ON MERIT IS NOT A FAIR SHAKE. IT’S THE OPPOSITE. IT’S PREJUDGING PEOPLE BASED ON CHARACTERISTICS THEY WERE BORN WITH AND CAN DO NOTHING ABOUT:   Newsflash: Stephen King is a Coward.

THE PROBLEM IS THAT IT’S NOT JUST THE BERNIE CAMPAIGN. THERE ARE A NOT INSIGNIFICANT NUMBER OF LEFTISTS WHO REALLY BELIEVE THIS STUFF.  WHAT THEY DON’T GET IS THE LEVEL OF INSURRECTION THEY WOULD FACE: VGulags Are Awesome, Says Bernie Organizer To Project Veritas.

Ah, well, truth be told they’ve been like this for 20 years. Ever since I could pass and would sit among them and listen.  It’s just that now the masks are coming off.

YEP, YET ANOTHER ATTEMPT BY THE WOKESCOLDS — AKA WHY WE CAN’T HAVE NICE THINGS — TO KILL AN INSTITUTION, SKIN IT AND PRANCE AROUND IN ITS SKIN DEMANDING RESPECT:  Romance Writers And The Bullying Woke Scolds.

One of the things I noticed is that they convince themselves that everyone respects them after. Even as we’re actively pelting them with (metaphoric) refuse. It’s an example of their “run to mommy” obsession. They think these institutions retain power after being skinsuited. Just yesterday someone threatened to denounce a bunch of us to SFWA for saying mean things about her. What she thinks an organization I no longer belong to and which has no power over me (or truthfully over anyone or anything) is going to do to me I don’t know. It’s like a kindergartener threatening me with his mommy. Or worse, a mommy threatening me with her kindergartner.

THE DIFFERENCE IS THAT ONO WAS AT LEAST IN TUNE WITH HER TIMES, (AND OF COURSE WASN’T LIVING AT THE EXPENSE OF A COUNTRY’S TAXPAYERS) WHILE THE DUCHESS FOR THE NONCE KNOWN AS SUSSEX IS GOING ASTONISHINGLY AND BIZARRELY AGAINST THE TIDE OF PUBLIC OPINION AND SIDING WITH THE WOKE WHO ARE ELITES IN THEIR OWN MINDS ONLY:  While Yoko Ono Makes For an Amusing Meme, There is Nothing Funny About Her Radical Roots.

As for Ono’s “art”…. pretentiousness and an attempt to shock long dead Victorians. Who at any rare were far more outrageous than she can even imagine. Bah.

THIS PECULIAR COMBINATION OF SELF-ASSURANCE AND UTTER, BIZARRE, ROCK BOTTOM STUPIDITY IS DISTURBINGLY COMMON ON THE LEFT:  Ilhan Omar, Dope.

The sad thing is that even that doesn’t explain the clown car that is their primary candidates. For that, you’re going to need to posit more stupidity.

AS WE STAND TOE TO TOE WITH THE BOOGALOO:  Ever Feel Like Custer?

Pray for sanity in Virginia’s government. Yes, I know it would take a miracle. But without it, the powder keg will blow. Where the explosion stops only future historians know. And they ain’t born yet.

AT AMAZON, save on Bestselling Jewelry. Valentine’s Day is less than a month away!

Plus, deals on Software.

DIANA WEST: How Communist Ideology Infiltrated America’s Security Agencies and Fueled Spygate.

LIFE IN 2020: ‘OK, Boomer’ makes a Supreme Court appearance in age case.

SEEN ON FACEBOOK:

WHY ARE BERNIE BROS SO VIOLENT? BREAKING: O’Keefe Drops Part 2: Bernie 2020 Organizer, “There Are Things More Important Than the Rule of Law in US” – Secret Service Notified Over Trump Assassination Concern.

OPEN THREAD: Enjoy every sandwich.

VIRGINIA HAS RATIFIED THE EQUAL RIGHTS AMENDMENT. This is basically meaningless, as the time set for ratification expired long ago, as did the dubious Congressional “extensions.” Some are prepared to argue that time limits on ratification are invalid, but there’s no authority for that, and it’s been common practice for decades.

Of course, a genuine, fairly-and-evenly-enforced Equal Rights Amendment would be a disaster for feminists, but they’re expecting to get something like the judicially-rewritten and expanded Title IX. But Keith Whittington is right:

If we think there is a serious need for the ERA and genuine support for it in the contemporary United States, then there is a ready solution—draft a new amendment, push it through Congress, and send it to the states. If we think that the ERA could not currently be adopted and ratified in a reasonable amount of time, then perhaps we should not be eager to say that the ERA is part of the Constitution because exactly three states legislatures have endorsed it since Jimmy Carter was in the White House.

If there’s support now, pass it now. If there isn’t support now it shouldn’t be ratified at all.

A NICE PIECE ON KNOXVILLE’S OWN CULINARY TREAT, steamed sandwiches. I’ve had those since I was a kid, and always loved them; the first time I had one was a near-religious experience. Still miss the Sam & Andy’s by campus, and the Roman Room.

PAUL KRUGMAN ON ELECTION NIGHT 2016: “If the question is when markets will recover, a first-pass answer is never.”

Today: Stocks Hit Record Highs As U.S. Signs Phase One Trade Deal With China.

UPDATE: China Pledges To Buy $200 Billion Of American Goods Under Phase One Trade Deal.

Plus: Landmark Trade Deal With China; New York Times Hardest Hit. “All in all, Phase One is a significant achievement of the Trump administration, accomplished in the face of hysterical opposition from the Democrats, who implicitly, at a minimum, have encouraged the Chinese not to make a deal, but rather to hold out in hopes of getting to negotiate with a Democrat in 2021. That context makes the administration’s accomplishment doubly impressive. President Trump understands the dynamic in play between the Red Chinese and the Democrats, and hasn’t been afraid to talk about it. Thus, today he signaled that he is not worried about the 2020 election, and the Chinese shouldn’t hold out in hopes of getting to negotiate with an anti-American like Bernie Sanders or a naif like Pete Buttigieg.”

HEH: Senate Asks Pelosi If She Can Send Over Copy Of Impeachment Articles Without Wine Stains All Over It.

SEEN ON FACEBOOK:

NEWS FROM MY TOWN: Knox County Mayor Glenn Jacobs to return to the WWE ring as Kane for SmackDown.

SEEMS ONLY FAIR. YOU WANT FAIRNESS, RIGHT? Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) Calls for Dem Presidential Candidates to Recuse Themselves from Senate Trial:

Today, Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) gave the following statement regarding the participation of the four Senators running for president in the Senate impeachment trial:

“Tomorrow, one hundred United States Senators will be sworn in to serve in the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump. Four of those Senators must recuse themselves for their unparalleled political interest in seeing this President removed from office. These four Democrats, Senators Bennet, Klobuchar, Sanders, and Warren, cannot sit in judgment of the very President they seek to replace. To participate in this trial would be a failure of the oath they took to be an ‘impartial justice according to the Constitution and laws’. Their presidential ambitions prohibit their ability to view this trial through an objective lens.” – Senator Marsha Blackburn

I had actually forgotten Bennet was running.

THE POLITICALLY INCORRECT TRUTH about obesity.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: 9 Reasons You Should Have A Baby This Year If You’re Young And Married.

RICHARD FERNANDEZ: Global Politics Becomes a House of Noise.

The oceans used to be a fluid coupling that prevented sudden external shocks from being transmitted to domestic politics. The heydays of Hydramatic were coincidentally those of the saying that “politics stops at the water’s edge,” uttered in reference to the bipartisan creation of NATO. But now the gears are fused. As foreign influence grew in Washington, the drive-train stayed clutched in with no more slip at the water’s edge. The enabling ideology for this was “multiculturalism” and a naive globalism, supposedly good for all, but which transmits the shocks directly to the political engine and may in time destroy it. It’s already led to Crossfire Hurricane, an impeachment, and on the return stroke what may be an equivalent investigation of Obama and/or his security staff. It won’t end there. There’ll be many more investigations and impeachments and no way to decouple from external forces.

Read the whole thing.

TRUMP’S PRESIDENCY IS A SYMPTOM, AND A REACTION TO, THE MORAL COLLAPSE FOSTERED BY HIS CRITICS ON THE LEFT AND RIGHT: Guy Who Called Daughter a ‘Thoughtless Pig’ Blames Trump Voters for ‘Near Moral Collapse’ of America. They thought the new standards were just for other people.