ANALYSIS: TRUE. “Anti-Racist” Education Is Neither.

NEW YORK TIMES: ‘CALIPHATE’ PODCAST DIDN’T MEET STANDARDS.

The New York Times admitted Friday that it could not verify the claims of a Canadian man whose account of committing atrocities for the Islamic State in Syria was a central part of its 2018 podcast “Caliphate.”

The series was a Pulitzer Prize finalist and had won a Peabody Award, the first ever for a podcast produced by the newspaper. Peabody administrators said the Times would return the award.

With a major hole blown in the narrative, the Times affixed an audio correction to the beginning of each part of the 12-part podcast and published an investigation into what went wrong with the story in Friday’s newspaper. The story’s central reporter, Rukmini Callimachi, will be reassigned off the terrorism beat, the Times said.

Dean Baquet, the paper’s executive editor, said in a podcast distributed Friday that “this failing wasn’t about any one reporter. I think this was an institutional failing.”

From Howell Raines and Jayson Blair to the “1619 Project” having its lunch eaten by leftist historians to the crybully staff getting the vapors over a Tom Cotton op-ed with majority approval, the Times, in their efforts to expand the Gramscian Damage, sure have been having a lot of those over the past 20 years.

KEEP TEXAS RED: Texas is still a red state, but the it’s not the Republican stronghold it used to be.

I have a plan.

WE’VE DESCENDED INTO SOME SORT OF BIZARRE HELL-WORLD IN WHICH RALPH NADER IS A VOICE OF SANITY: Ralph Nader Slams Obama For Being A Phony: ‘Mass media interviewing Obama about his book. Couldn’t be softer.’

Just think of the media as Democratic Party operatives with bylines terrified of upsetting their former boss, and it all makes sense.

NEWS FROM MY WORLD: UT College of Law ranks 14th best value nationally. “The magazine also ranked the College of Law among the top 13 in the nation for students who want to study business law.”

ROGER SIMON: The ‘Deplorables’ Must Cement Control of the Republican Party.

Reading Glenn Reynolds’ heartening article in the NY Post —“It’s time for the ‘Deplorables’ to become the Unconquerables”—inspired me to say something I’ve been thinking for a while.

It’s time for the “Deplorables” fully to take over the Republican Party.

Some have suggested starting a new party—and I can understand that, given the frustrations—but why go to the trouble when you have the numbers to have all the power?

An existing party apparatus is sitting there and is there for the taking. Let’s do it.

Just to be clear—who do I mean by the “deplorables”?

They are the decent, hard-working Americans of all classes that revere our democratic republic and our founding documents and deplore (in the real sense of the word) the Deep State and the dominance of Washington DC over our lives.

They reject bureaucracy, the uni-party of insiders, and the dangerous Orwellian pervasiveness of Big Tech and its social media tentacles replete with censorship and thought control.

They also seek to preserve liberty and the capitalist system of open markets, while opposing, with all their strength, the incursions of socialism and communism into our country through the influence of the Communist Party of China and others on and in our media, religious institutions, entertainment and educational system.

Above all, they adamantly support our Bill of Rights with freedom of speech and worship and the right to bear arms impregnable.

As of now, these “deplorables” are at least seventy-four million strong—and are, in essence, more unified than any other group, even though sometimes they do not realize it.

This movement is only partly about Donald Trump. He can be looked upon as a founding father of this renewal of American values but, as he himself has said on multiple occasions, this is about us.

In any case, like all of us, Trump will not be here forever, even if he ultimately wins the 2020 election or runs again in 2024.

New leadership must be found and, in the tradition of Trump, we should be free to look outside the political class, just as our founders hoped.

In fact, that should be a hallmark of this renewed Republican Party, bringing forth candidates from all contributing walks of American life.

New perspectives will work to the benefit of all. In actuality, conservatives are the more natural innovators—as Trump demonstrated in the Middle East, for example—liberals and progressives the conformists.

This does not mean that professional politicians should necessarily be excluded.  They should be evaluated, as all should be, and not given a laissez-passer to a position of power.

A good starting point in this evaluation of the existing political class is their reactions to the 2020 election. Those who quickly opted for a “business as usual” response that was and is not merited should be disdained and replaced.

Political power in our culture has become, has been for years, a passageway to wealth.

The new Republican Party should be the party Cincinattus, of those who come to serve the public good temporarily before returning to their private lives, not to profit from a lengthy sojourn in the nation’s capitol.

We should consequently encourage term limits.

In what now seems like a distant America, Democratic house speaker Tip O’Neill told us “All politics is local.” He was right then, but only partially right now in the internet age.

Nevertheless, we must act locally, taking over as many state and city Republican Party institutions as possible.

This must be begun immediately as the forces of reaction and stasis—call them RINOs, NeverTrumpers or whatever you want—are moving in quickly to take advantage of a likely illusory Biden victory.

These people have no leverage other than habit, the leverage of “being there” in party committees, think tanks, and so forth. It is a leverage that is paper thin and should be regarded as such.

While many are depressed over a stolen election, as Reynolds pointed out in his article, a rebirth can come from it. Whatever evil has occurred, we—the “deplorables”—have shown ourselves to be the most united force extant and the most powerful, should we choose to take it.

As Roger writes, “While many are depressed over a stolen election, as Reynolds pointed out in his article, a rebirth can come from it. Whatever evil has occurred, we—the ‘deplorables’—have shown ourselves to be the most united force extant and the most powerful, should we choose to take it.”

THE POWER LINE WEEK IN PICTURES: Doctor Who Edition.

MIKE PENCE RECEIVES COVID VACCINE ON LIVE TELEVISION.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: UMich’s IT department told to stop using word ‘picnic,’ it could ‘harm morale.’

You know what’s worse for morale? Realizing you work with idiots who thing “picnic” is offensive.

OH, THE HUMANITY! America’s most prominent Native-American in the U.S. Senate has been snubbed by His Fraudulency for a cabinet post. Will Warren don warpaint?

TOM CRUISE RANT DUBBED INTO CLASSIC ‘RUDOLPH’ CLIP ON TWITTER:

Santa needs to get his mouth washed out with soap.

It was almost mission impossible, but a Twitter user managed to make Saint Nick spew Tom Cruise’s F-word-laced rant by dubbing the TV special “Rudolph the Red-Nose Reindeer,” which first aired in 1964, Fox News reported.

“This is my December passion project,” wrote Jason Gallagher, who posted the hilarious mashup, which shows Santa flying off the handle a la Cruise in front of a cast of characters from the iconic show.

Looking on in apparent abject horror are Rudolph, the Abominable Snowman and Yukon Cornelius, among others.

On the flip-side, at Breitbart.com, veteran film critic John Nolte writes:

Two things are worthy of note here… If you listen to the entire audio, he never once says anything about PEOPLE ARE GOING TO DIE!!! YOU’RE KILLING PEOPLE!!! YOU’RE A SERIAL KILLER! There’s none of that BS, none of that anti-science, smug and sanctimonious emotional blackmail. What Cruise is worried about, and Mission: Impossible 7 was already shut down once due to a coronavirus outbreak, is everyone losing their jobs and homes.

On top of that, Cruise is saying that this film set represents the standard now being used throughout the industry, and that standard is allowing other productions to go back to work. So if the Mission: Impossible 7 standard fails, that could mean everyone gets shut down, and that’s a lot of jobs.

Listen, I made a living for 17 years as a corporate bill collector and have been at the wrong end of my own share of what we used to call Come To Jesus Meetings, and they were a lot worse than this. That doesn’t mean it’s right for Cruise to be calling everyone a “motherf***er,” but one thing I always appreciated about those Come To Jesus Meetings was the honesty. You knew where you stood. It was coming straight at you.

And let’s also not forget that this is not a “star tantrum.”

Cruise is a producer, a hands-on producer of this franchise. There’s $200 million he’s responsible for and everything about the guy’s reputation tells you he takes that responsibility seriously.

I can see Nolte’s point, but much of the public is listening to Cruise’s rant with two issues in mind. First as the late Cathy Seipp wrote at NRO in 2005 in a piece titled “California Screaming,” Hollywood superstars and executives often come equipped with serious anger issues, and thanks to clips like Cruise’s and former Batman star Christian Bale’s rant on the set of Terminator Salvation going viral on social media, moviegoers increasingly knows this:

Behind the New Age grin of beatific self-righteousness with which so many Hollywood celebrities greet the world often lurks a tantrum ready to erupt. When the full, roiling boil is over, the slow simmer can last for weeks, if not months. By comparison, old-style screamers can seem quaint, almost benign. The storm may have been intense, but it passed quickly. A classic of the type–the agent Norman Brokaw, for instance–could suggest lunch within minutes of a blowup. And the scream usually took the form of a statement: “Get outta here!”

But new-style screamers eschew declarative sentences for rhetorical, F. Lee Bailey-esque questions: “What were you thinking? Why did you even pick up the phone? Do you even have a brain?” This can be harder to bear. As an observer told me once, “If it’s ‘You’re fired,’ then at least you’re out. If it’s someone trying to teach you a lesson, you’re there, and you’re stuck.”

Some screamers can hardly utter a sentence that doesn’t contain the f-word. The syllable almost seems to function as their sound, signifying only that they are in the room. Others are more careful with their language, because being sworn at is the point where many screamees stop listening and may even quit. So bland, schoolmarmish words of displeasure are amplified to ear-splitting volume. A vein-popping “Un-ACC-EPT-able!” is a great favorite. Also, a drawn out “DIS…A…PPOINTED!!!”

When in full throttle, the classic Hollywood screamer cannot be neither stopped nor shamed. I once heard a story about a studio executive who screamed at someone’s assistant for a good five minutes before realizing he was in the wrong office–possibly even on the wrong floor. “Well, if you see her,” he yelled before stomping out, “tell her what I said!”

Screaming actors, it seems, can be easier to deal with, perhaps because they are not always famous for their brains. Many years ago, I read a story about how Roger Moore (a nonscreamer) took a younger actor aside and suggested he stop attacking everyone on the set. “I’m not in this business to win a popularity contest,” the screamer fumed. “I just want to be a good actor.”

“Well, you’ve failed at being a good actor,” Moore replied reasonably. “Why not try for the popularity contest?”

Then there’s the giant clam in the room, as America’s Newspaper of Record reported earlier this week: ‘We Must Follow The Science!’ Screams Actor Who Believes Xenu Dumped Frozen Aliens Into Volcanoes And Exploded Them With Bombs 75,000,000 Years Ago.

MORE CONSEQUENCES, PLEASE: ‘Black Affinity Coalition’ suspends strike after realizing there will be consequences. A strike is when people stop producing value. Students produce nothing of value. Perhaps withholding tuition would count, but students usually aren’t the ones paying that.

I DON’T THINK HE THOUGHT THIS THROUGH: State auditor demands nearly $2k from Ole Miss prof who went on ‘illegal’ strike.

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JIM TREACHER: Seattle Councilwoman Calls Cops She Wants to Defund.

Whenever I see somebody condoning or actually cheering on rioting and other crime, I ask for their home address. Not because I want an answer — I’m not a doxer — but because I want them to think about what they’re saying. It’s easy to cheer on “uprisings” and “mostly peaceful protests” when it doesn’t affect you personally. It’s easy to shrug when people are watching their businesses and lives go up in smoke, because you don’t know those people. They’re just abstractions. Too bad about their misery, but at least you’re still okay, right?

Until violent crime comes to your doorstep. Then what do you do? You call the cops, of course. The same guys you want to defund. The same guys you’ve spent your whole life demonizing. And they’ll show up to do the job you didn’t want them to do, right up until the minute you needed help.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: The only thing worse than cops is no cops. I know firsthand what it’s like to deal with bad cops (GFY, DC Police!), and I’m absolutely in favor of police reform. But abolishing the police isn’t the answer. Bad cops suck, but not as much as a complete breakdown of civil society. The only people who don’t realize that yet are the ones whose living room windows haven’t been smashed in.

And it gets better! Seattle politician who defunded the police called 911 to protect her from a crime she wants to legalize.

All the best socialists assured me earlier this year that dialing 911 was the height of white privilege.

THE BIDEN ILLEGITIMACY: In the poll, when asked, “Is President-elect Biden your president?” 56% said yes, 34% no, and 10% were not sure.

Lots of people think the election was stolen. Democrats and the news media — but I repeat myself — are trying to portray this as a fringe view, but it’s anything but.

WHY IS THE MSM SUPPRESSING FACTS ABOUT HCQ AND COVID? C. Boyden Gray rips apart the Mainstream Media’s coverup of the full facts about the effectiveness of Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) in treating Covid.

“The current accepted press narrative on hydroxychloroquine is that no evidence exists showing it is effective for treating COVID-19, and that it can, in fact, be harmful. Any person who suggests otherwise is accused of being ‘anti-science’ and a promoter of ‘conspiracy theories’ and ‘disinformation.’

“First, there is strong evidence that hydroxychloroquine is helpful in treating COVID-19 when administered early in the disease — notably, from studies by the Mount Sinai Health System in New York and the Henry Ford Health System in Detroit, which both showed that the drug cut the mortality rate for COVID-19 patients nearly in half. Large multi-hospital collaborations in Belgium and the Netherlands and numerous smaller studies have also demonstrated benefits,” Gray writes for American Greatness.

ONE YEAR AGO: Surveillance footage outside Jeffrey Epstein’s cell during suicide attempt is missing.

Related: Jeffrey Epstein’s suicide still looms over the federal Bureau of Prisons 1 year later. “‘We will get to the bottom of it, and there will be accountability,’ Attorney General William Barr said just days after the suicide.”

So how did that work out? Anybody lose their job?

Plus: “One federal source said there has been no movement on the internal investigation looking at BOP’s shortfalls with Epstein’s death and none on the investigation into the 2018 death of Whitey Bulger, the legendary leader of the Boston-based Winter Hill Gang. Bulger was beaten to death at United States Penitentiary Hazelton in West Virginia.”

WE’VE DESCENDED INTO SOME SORT OF BIZARRE HELL-WORLD IN WHICH MATTHEW YGLESIAS IS A VOICE OF SANITY: Expert to NYT: We could “level the playing field” by vaccinating essential workers before seniors since seniors are “whiter.”

Second, Matt Yglesias is right that deprioritizing senior citizens will backfire on race-minded wokesters by delaying the vaccine for a group that needs it urgently:

If you believe that Black Lives Matter, logically you should worry about the black lives that are most at risk. Those are indeed black senior citizens, as Yglesias says. It’s idiotic to want a 35-year-old white cashier to get the vaccine before a 75-year-old African-American grandmother because there’s a higher percentage of African-Americans in the “essential worker” group than there is among senior citizens. Get the vaccine to the people who need it most urgently. Contorted racialized arguments for doing otherwise reeks of virtue-signaling.

Read the whole thing.

NOT SURE THAT’S CONSTITUTIONAL:  The VA has said that it plans to prioritize racial minority members over whites in the distribution of the COVID vaccine.  My colleague Peter Kirsanow and I express our misgivings here.