HE’S NOT OBLIVIOUS, HE’S CONTEMPTUOUS. Bloomberg’s Constitutionally Oblivious Gun Battles. If he were just oblivious, he’d be educable.
Archive for 2020
February 19, 2020
YOU’RE GONNA NEED A BIGGER BLOG: New freelance law AB5 illustrates what’s wrong with the Democratic super-majority in Sacramento.
No really, you’re definitely gonna need a bigger blog:
AND ANOTHER THING: Boeing Finds Debris In MAX Fuel Tanks.
Boeing is inspecting all 737 MAXs it has in storage and adding factory-floor precautions after discovering foreign object debris (FOD) in the fuel tanks of multiple MAXs, the company confirmed late Feb. 18.
Debris was found in “multiple” MAX during routine maintenance linked with keeping its stored aircraft as close to flight-ready as possible, a source with knowledge of the situation told Aviation Week.
“We’ve already held a series of stand down meetings in Renton with teammates on the factory floor to share a new process for stopping FOD,” 737 vice president and general manager Mark Jenks wrote in a memo to employees.
Changes to MAX production—which remains suspended—include updated instructions and checklists for work in “fuel cell areas,” and additional inspections before closing fuel cells during production, Jenks wrote.
PREVIOUSLY: Boeing KC-46 Air Force tanker jets grounded due to tools and debris left during manufacturing.
COCAINE MITCH WILL HAVE THIS SLOT FILLED BY MAY: Federal Judge Resigns Amid Sex Harass Controversy. Appointed by Bill Clinton.
ADVICE FOR YOUNG MEN, FROM STACY MCCAIN:
Always act like a winner, even when you lose. If you really want revenge against the girl who dumped you, the thing to do is to carry on with your life as if you’ve suffered no pain at all. If she’s done you wrong, there are other women in the world who’ll do you right. Or such would be my advice, if any heartbroken young guy sought my advice.
It’s good advice, and not just for love.
EH, LIKE THE SONG SAYS, TWO OUT OF THREE AIN’T BAD: Trump Uses Clemency To Help Drug War Victims, Reward GOP Donors, and Spite James Comey.
While much of the media coverage focused on Blagojevich and some of the other high-profile names on Trump’s clemency list (more on that in a moment), there are others whose names you don’t know but probably should.
People like Crystal Munoz, who spent the past 12 years in prison for a nonviolent drug offense. Munoz was convicted in 2007 of assisting a marijuana smuggling operation because she drew a map of a dirt road near Big Bend National Park in Texas. That map was used by drug smugglers, and the Drug Enforcement Administration eventually traced it back to Munoz, who got a 19-year prison sentence despite the fact that she never possessed or sold any of the drugs.
Nothing about Munoz’s case suggests that the 40-year-old mother of two girls is a danger to society who needs to be kept in a cage—she’s just another person in an endless line of drug war victims. Thankfully, Trump’s clemency order will allow her to return to her family.
People like Munoz are “are the forgotten majority of the country’s crisis in mass incarceration, a crisis that disproportionately impacts lower-income communities and communities of color, and they are every bit as deserving of a second chance,” said Holly Harris, executive director of the Justice Action Network, a criminal justice reform nonprofit that advocated for Munoz’s release. In a statement, Harris said she hopes Trump will “use this executive power to grant more commutations and clemencies in due course for any of the thousands of deserving individuals who are neither rich, nor famous, nor connected.”
I predict that will happen.
UPDATE: Politico: I Covered Blago’s Trial From Start To Finish. Trump’s Commutation Isn’t Crazy. “There was one sentiment I heard over and over again, which went something like, ‘I know Blagojevich was guilty as hell, but 14 years is insane.'”
MAYBE, BUT WE SEE A LOT OF REPORTS ABOUT THE TRUMP WHITE HOUSE THAT TURN OUT TO BE NOTHING: Attorney General Barr to Quit Over Trump’s Tweeting?
SOMEBODY COMPILED A HUGE STACK OF OPPO ON HIM, AND THEY’RE DUMPING IT HARD. BUT WHO? Bloomberg called transgender people ‘it’ and ‘some guy wearing a dress.’ The funny thing is, most of these “gaffes” would play fine in a general election, but not during a Democratic primary.
WAYBACK MACHINE: Remember Obama’s Iran Deal Pardons?
NICK KRISTOF: I worry about Sanders, and his coattails.
There is one kind of candidate that Americans remain hostile to. Only 45% say that they would be willing to vote for a socialist. And Sanders faces another hurdle: Only 69% say they would consider a candidate over 70.
These are generic questions, and it’s possible that voters would warm to a particular septuagenarian socialist, especially when the alternative is a certain septuagenarian Republican. In head-to-head polls against Trump, Sanders does well; all Democrats do similarly. Yet I keep thinking of how British voters recently overwhelmingly reelected a deeply flawed conservative leader over a socialist challenger.
Supporters of Sanders believe that he would greatly increase turnout, but there was no sign of that in Iowa or New Hampshire. Sanders won in New Hampshire only because the liberal wing of the party is uniting around him, while the moderate wing is deeply divided.
I’m not getting cocky, but I am feeling unusually happy.
SEGREGATION NOW, SEGREGATION TOMORROW, SEGREGATION FOREVER: UVA students affirm that white people should avoid coming to campus multicultural center.
AUSTIN BAY: Coronavirus Tests The World’s Economic Vigor.
HOW’S THAT DOPEY-FEARY STUFF WORKIN’ OUT FOR YA? One thing unites establishment Democrats: Fear of Sanders.
ABOUT THOSE DOJ FORMERS CALLING FOR BARR’S RESIGNATION: Turns out, surprise! surprise! they are down-the-line Democrat partisans.
KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEF: Michael Bloomberg Is Satan—Discuss. “He is at least an equal opportunity condescending moron, hating white midwesterners as much as he does people of color.”
THAT THROUPLE ON HOUSE HUNTERS PUT THIS OVER THE TOP, DIDN’T IT? Utah Senate votes to decriminalize polygamy among consenting adults.
“MIKE BLOOMBERG’S VISION PROVED TO BE A CUL-DE-SAC.” Joel Kotkin: The Luxury City Is Going Bust.
CORONAVIRUS EPIDEMIC TESTS THE WORLD’S ECONOMIC VIGOR:
In the last three weeks, a spate of corporate and governmental announcements shows the U.S. and Chinese economies remain entwined.
For example, Apple warned investors that the coronavirus epidemic will prevent it from meeting first-quarter profit expectations. Domestic Chinese demand for Apple products has declined sharply. The epidemic has also disrupted iPhone production in China. Apple remains a blue chip company, but it faces demand and supply chain problems.
The epidemic has also disrupted the world’s largest mobile phone industry trade show, the Mobile World Congress. On Feb. 12, the MWC decided to cancel its annual Barcelona conference. Fear the disease may spread is one reason, but travel restrictions from East Asia would have reduced attendance.
The virus even bugs the oil business, “with Iran a definite loser.” Read the entire essay.
EAGLE WITH A RISING SUN ON VALENTINE’S DAY: Scrambled symbols? No, another photo from Exercise Cope North 2020 held at Anderson Air Force Base, Guam. A Koku Jieitai (Japan Air Self-Defense Force) F-15MJ Eagle flies over the Pacific and the photographer gets a great shot of the plane’s red disc “Rising Sun” nationality symbols (roundels). Photo take Feb. 14, 2020. This post from late 2019 has some background on the Japanese F-15 and its recent upgrades. The post also discusses Japan’s decision to buy F-35As.
RELATED: The Rising Sun flag (sun with rays) occasionally stirs controversy in South Korea. Scroll down through this post for a historical sketch.
Japanese atrocities during World War II are also still an issue in China and throughout East Asia but South Korea is a special case as it is a democracy with a free press and politicians and editors always have, and often use, the option to revive one of the many Japanese “crimes against humanity” and the Korean people.
Historical context for the “news.”
ERIC KAUFMAN: Why the Left Is Losing.
Identity politics and multiculturalism are central motivating forces for the highly-educated activists who have dominated left-wing parties since the ’68 generation rose to prominence. These ideas tend to be considerably less popular than the Left’s economic offer, hence the bind the Left finds itself in.
Yet this alone cannot explain the inflexibility of left-wing parties. To do so requires an additional ingredient: the rise of political correctness. Political correctness functions as an emergent system that can push new ideas even when few people actually believe in them. Like the emperor’s new clothes, no one dares violate a taboo which may cost them dearly.
To be blunt, left-wing political correctness is more powerful than the right-wing variant. For instance, many social conservatives may dislike environmentalist candidates in their ranks, but dissidents on the left of a conservative party won’t have their character questioned and reputation trashed. By contrast, a left-wing politician who moves right on culture—calling for lower immigration or abolishing female-only shortlists, for instance—is likely to be accused of racism or sexism by radical online activists. This causes them intense embarrassment and, by triggering a social taboo, may lead others to pile on them to signal virtue. This can damage a person’s reputation well beyond politics. Something of this fate has befallen the patriotic leftists of Blue Labour in the UK, who are no longer welcome in Labour circles. Brexit-supporting Paul Embery, for instance, was kicked out of the Fire Brigades Union for criticizing the union’s position on Brexit. This, they alleged, made him an accomplice of the “nationalist Right” and thus a “disgrace to the traditions of the Labour movement.” No wonder few on the Left are willing to move right on culture.
They’re making their appeal more selective. Or as Stacy McCain noted years ago, “You don’t build a winning coalition through a process of subtraction.”
UPDATE (FROM GLENN): Andrew Davis: A Time For Choosing.