AT AMAZON, Shop Amazon Warehouse Deals – Deep Discounts on Open-box and Used Products.

Plus, Shop Amazon Outlet – Clearance, Markdowns and Overstock Deals.

COUNTRY OVER PARTY! Why Democrats should come together — and support Trump: They can’t unite over Sanders or Bloomberg. They can save the country from the evils of factionalism.

THAT’S DIFFERENT BECAUSE SHUT UP: ‘Obama Personally Asked the FBI to Investigate Someone on Behalf of George Soros,’ Says Alan Dershowitz.

Elsewhere at PJMedia, I have a little something for our VIP members: Blue on Blue: Bernie Bros vs. Mini Mike. “Bloomberg isn’t just buying up airtime; he’s buying up all the talent at pay-rates the other campaigns can’t match. It’s one thing to find a rival candidate’s people going door-to-door in your neighborhood. It’s another thing to find that there aren’t any people left for you to hire to do the same thing.”

That VODKAPUNDIT discount code is still good for a nice little discount if you’ve been thinking of joining.

IS IT A THORIUM REACTOR? OTHERWISE I’M NOT INTERESTED. This Guy Is Trying to Sell His Homemade Nuclear Reactor.

NOTHING TO SEE HERE, MOVE ALONG: India Captures Chinese Ship Going To Pakistan With Components Of Ballistic Missiles.

THE GRIFTERS:

● Shot: Mika: Will Bloomberg Put ‘Money Where His Mouth Is’ to Get ‘Pass’ from Al Sharpton?

—NewsBusters, today.

● Chaser: Al Sharpton’s failed 2004 presidential campaign still owes nearly $1 million in debt.

—The Blaze, today.

SHOCKING AND UNEXPECTED NEWS FROM THE WORLD OF SCIENCE: Use of ketamine among partygoers could be underreported.

DOWNSIZING: GM plans to pull out of Australia, New Zealand and Thailand.

BILL DE BLASIO IS BRINGING BACK THE BAD OLD DAYS: Squeegee men, scourge of the ‘90s, are back in New York.

AT AMAZON, XMRE Meals 1300XT – 12 Case with Heaters (Meal Ready to Eat – Military Grade).

CORN, POPPED: It’s Looking More and More Like Nevada Will Be Another Democratic Clusterfark.

LIFE IN THE 21ST CENTURY: Oh Sweetie! Boys Make Better Girls. “In today’s world, girls are told to embrace their power. Lean-in, because what used to be ‘bossy’ is now ‘assertive.’ Today’s young women are guzzling the ‘you are enough!’ Kool-Aid. But when it comes to girl’s athletics, sit down sweetie. Boys make better girls.”

WHAT COULD GO WRONG? Bernie Sanders is far more radical than Corbyn’s Labour.

NEITHER THE ONION NOR THE BABYLON BEE: Russians posing as Greta Thunberg dupe Sanders in prank call: You’re a sleeper KGB agent!

SHOCKER: Some Assisted-Living Residents Don’t Get Promised Care, Suit Charges.

YOU’RE GONNA NEED A BIGGER BLOG: Democratic Presidential Clown Car Update for February 17, 2020. “Bloomberg channels Barney, Yang, Bennet and Patrick are Out, enjoy the Buttigieg Platitude Generator, Bernie bros break out the blacklist for Bloomberg hires, and Mayor Pete has a fake Nigerian problem.”

THE HOUSING PRICE OF LIBERALISM. Greenification: Environmental policy is fueling Boston’s housing crisis.

(Classical reference in headline.)

I CAN’T IMAGINE ANY FAIR-MINDED PERSON IS SURPRISED:  Evidence that conservative students really do self-censor.  

BRITAIN: How can the governing classes be so naive about the threats we face?

Britain once pursued its national interest with such cynical single-mindedness that European diplomats came to call us “perfidious Albion”. Yet these days, on the international stage, we are hopelessly naive. This weekend we learned that Huawei – the Chinese telecommunications company that will help to build our 5G network – secretly funded a Cambridge University study into the global governance of communications and technology. Cambridge denied that Huawei had the right to veto its findings, but the Chinese had no need to do so: predictably, the authors praised their paymasters.

“Elite capture”, as intelligence agencies call it, is part of China’s strategy to undermine its rivals, kill questions about its actions, and use the openness of liberal democracies against them. And universities are an important part of the game. Chinese students now provide one fifth of university tuition fee income, and take one in 10 places at Russell Group universities. Dependence on Chinese revenues is such that vice chancellors worry that the coronavirus could bring about a funding crisis.

It is doubtful this is all they worry about, given their reliance on Chinese cash. Universities are supposed to be seats of free thinking and independent research. But the Chinese state is open about its willingness to use its financial muscle to shut down criticism and dissent.

There’s nothing elite about “elites” who sell out their own countrymen.

SOURCE: Democrat Senator Held Secret Meeting In Munich With Iranian Foreign Minister Zarif.

BREAKING: Big Second Amendment Victory in… Virginia?

Yes, in Virginia.

Elsewhere at PJMedia, Paula Bolyard has some encouraging figures for our VIP members: More Bad News for Dems: Trump Is Outraising Them in Ohio’s Biggest Democrat Strongholds.

That VODKAPUNDIT discount code is still good for a nice little discount if you’ve been thinking of joining.

YOU CAN’T CON AN HONEST MEDIA: Hilarious Video Montage of Media Slobbering Love Affair with Convicted Creepy Porn Lawyer Michael Avenatti.

EVERGREEN: Biden: ‘Last time we ran’ African American votes were ‘basically taken for granted.’

WELL, LIKE THE REST OF THE PRC: Hong Kong Is Showing Symptoms of a Failed State: With empty supermarket shelves and rising public distrust, the coronavirus-hit city is ticking most of the boxes.

Grocery runs in Asia’s financial powerhouse have begun to remind me of shopping in Russia in the chaotic summer of 1998. You grab what you can find, and if there is a queue, you consider joining it. Surgical masks and sanitizer gel are bartered for; detergent shelves are bare. A run on toilet paper last week, after an online rumor, was reminiscent of Venezuela.

Crowds are irrational everywhere, and social media hardly helps. Yet the palpable anxiety in coronavirus-hit Hong Kong these days suggests worrying levels of distrust in a city where citizens have always expected private enterprise at least, if not the state, to keep things ticking over. Both have failed miserably, preparing inadequately even after the SARS outbreak that killed almost 300 people in the city in 2003.

A fragile state is usually defined by its inability to protect citizens, to provide basic services and by questions over the legitimacy of its government. After an epidemic and months of poorly handled pro-democracy demonstrations, Hong Kong is ticking most of those boxes. Add in a strained judicial system, and the prognosis for its future as a financial hub looks poor.

A snapshot of the situation first. Hong Kong is not, at least for now, as grim as parts of mainland China, where the outbreak of novel coronavirus has people building barricades, or being followed around by drones. This isn’t Wuhan. Yet after 26 confirmed cases and one death, the semi-autonomous territory of more than 7 million people is in lockdown, with schools, universities and museums closed. A $360 billion economy, torn apart by months of anti-government protests, is in tatters. Masks are in such short supply that some clinics have closed, and queues snake daily outside pharmacies. Official declarations, meanwhile, have attracted derision on social media: One senior politician argued in the Legislative Council that disposable masks could be steam-cleaned, ignoring the remonstrations of the city’s Centre for Health Protection.

For someone who arrived recently from orderly Singapore, it’s a mess that’s hard to comprehend.

To be fair, though, Singapore isn’t run by a bunch of commies.