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JOHN HINDERAKER: Socialism Causes Underage Prostitution. “Adam Smith said there is a lot of ruin in a country, but Venezuela is getting ridiculous. How much lower can socialism drag that once-prosperous place?”

I’M GLAD TO SEE SOMEONE IN GOVERNMENT PUSHING PROVEN SOLUTIONS INSTEAD OF POLITICAL GIMMICKS: Texas AG: Texans can use concealed-carry laws to stop mass shootings.

TOO BAD THERE WEREN’T MORE AROUND: Texas Rangers: Armed Citizen ‘Engaged’ Killer, Ending Rampage.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Why Haven’t You Left School?

Restless and anxious as a student of the No Child Left Behind-era in public schools, I wondered why we were spending so much time sitting in assemblies about the PSSA (Pennsylvania System of School Assessment) tests and how to properly answer multiple-choice questions when that had no bearing on what I wanted to learn about. Why were we focusing on some ridiculous state-enforced standards that the teachers themselves admitted were totally arbitrary? Why did we take several weeks per year to do these exams? Why were the classes I enjoyed getting cut back for the ones that were enforced through testing regimens? High school became little more than jumping through hoops for state administrators.

School took me away from the learning I wanted to engage in and made me focus on things I didn’t want. I loved learning; I just hated school.

That was pretty much the Insta-Daughter’s story. The first semester of high school she tracked how they used her time and found that shockingly little of it — like 2-3 hours a day — was on actual learning. The rest was busywork, assemblies, etc. That’s why she quit and went to online (Kaplan) high school, graduating early at 16 after taking far more AP courses than her allegedly fancy public high school offered.

And this on college seems dead-on, too:

Universities and colleges weren’t causes of aristocracy and wealth; they were products of aristocracy and wealth. Aristocrats didn’t send their children to universities to make sure they got the tools necessary to stay aristocrats — they sent them because it was essentially several years of leisure and only the most well-off could afford such a lifestyle.

The university was never intended to train people for high-wage jobs or to lift them up the economic ladder. At best it was an institution to train the clergy in the Middle Ages and then academics in the industrial age. This is why liberal-arts schools place such heavy emphasis on academic subjects — they were designed to create professors.

As global wealth increased through the Industrial Revolution, aristocrats who were already comfortable in their wealth had two options for their children who were coming of age: A) send them to work, or B) give them some leisure among their same class. The university evolved into an institution to help young aristocratic men to transition into adulthood by moving away from home and studying subjects only the most well-off had the leisure to study. The backgrounds of elite American universities make this obvious. Princeton has “eating clubs”; Penn has “the Philomathean society”; and Yale’s secret society culture is a relic of this era.

This isn’t a conspiracy. It’s simply saying that the universities were never intended or designed for the use to which Americans of the mid-20th century put them.

Yep. Read the entire essay, which is excellent.

UH OH: Sen. Rand Paul’s injuries far more severe than initially thought. “Sen. Rand Paul is recovering from five broken ribs and bruises to his lungs, and it is unclear when he will return to Washington, aides said Sunday, signaling that injuries he sustained Friday are far more severe than initially thought.”

Plus, on his assailant:

Jim Bullington, a former member of the city commission, knows both men. He said Sunday that Boucher is divorced and lives alone. Bullington described Boucher as a socialist.

“He’s pretty much the opposite of Rand Paul in every way,” Bullington said in an interview.

The neighbors had been known to have “heated discussions” about health care, Bullington said, adding that Boucher is an advocate of a national health system.

I guess the whole “agree to disagree” thing didn’t work for him.

JUST HEARD THE LIVE NEWS CONFERENCE ABOUT THE MASS MURDERS IN SUTHERLAND SPRINGS, TEXAS: The mass murders were another act of pure evil. According to a statement made during a live news conference introduced by Texas governor Greg Abbott, an armed citizen engaged the mass murderer outside the church. When fired upon, the evil murderer dropped his weapon and fled. Fascinating. Community defense by an armed citizenry. Let’s see how this information plays out in mainstream media. (bumped)

No link yet on press conference but I’m not sure that matters.

UPDATE: Range of age of murder victims runs from five to 72. Fox News now confirms 26 dead in the attack on the First Baptist Church of Sutherland, Texas. Fox News also confirms the murderer was a man named Devin Patrick Kelley. He shot two people outside the church before he entered the church sanctuary then shot and killed another 23 inside the church. The 26th person died of wounds. Police found Kelley dead in his vehicle after he fled his crime scene. At this moment authorities have not determined if Kelley died of a self-inflicted wound or died from shots fired by the armed citizen.

DEVELOPING MEME THAT CHALLENGES LEFTIST MAINSTREAM: The armed citizen who fired on the mass murderer is being described on Fox News as “a good Samaritan.” I agree. The as yet unnamed armed citizen was rendering aid to fellow human beings in life-threatening, life-taking circumstances. The armed citizen who engaged the murderer –engaged the murderer with bullets– was saving lives. Bullets saving lives. How will the mainstream media address this? Commenters, please, like the chorus you are, explain this evolving history. Will “An Armed Citizen’s Bullets That Are Protected By The Second Amendment Saved Lives” ever be a mainstream media headline?

UPDATE 2: How many people have to die before benighted Democrats like Barack Obama laud the Second Amendment?

UPDATE 3: The armed citizen is now being described as “a local resident.” OK, I buy it. This isn’t a Texas phenomenon. This is the physical display of an American civil right doing what it is intended to do. September 7, 1876 — the James-Younger gang attacks Northfield, Minnesota. Armed local residents defend their town against the thugs.

JOHN HINDERAKER: Does the Republican Tax Plan “Screw Democratic Voters”?

MICHAEL WALSH ON BREAKING THE NFL HABIT: “Simply stop watching television, except for movies and the occasional compelling series — and these you don’t need a television set for; your computer or tablet will do just fine, and news is readily available on the internet for free. I realize that the addiction is hard to break. Then again, so was our national addiction to cigarettes, and today you hardly ever see anyone smoking them. The day is coming when the NFL will contract rather than expand — both L.A. franchises are doomed — and return to its modest working-class roots as a minor spectator sport, one to be desultorily followed rather than obsessed over.”

Sure sounds like Vin Scully concurs with that advice.

SALENA ZITO: America still hasn’t recovered from Trump’s shocking win. But what she really means is, Democratic America hasn’t recovered:

There’s still a sharp pain in Sarah Moberly’s gut. The hurt and disbelief she felt watching the presidential election one year ago remains ever-present.

In fact, it has escalated.

“Honestly, I feel absolutely worse today than I did last year and it just keeps getting worse every day,” she told The Post. “The moment that Hillary conceded, it was a feeling of complete doom. That’s the only way I can put it. I went to bed, I put the covers over my head. I woke up the next morning, I put the covers back over my head, and I didn’t want to get out of bed for like a week,” she said. “I kept thinking, this is a dream and that I’d wake up. Nope, that wasn’t a dream that really just happened.”

And compare and contrast:

The table is stacked with comfort food — mashed potatoes, burgers, french fries, eggs and bacon — but it’s offering little solace. Moberly fidgets and can barely make eye contact with the Trump voters, even when they try to engage with her. . . .

Suddenly Moberly turned to Stearns, an insurance agent and female Trump voter, and spoke: “It’s hard for me to look at another woman who voted for him, with the misogyny that has been involved in this whole process. I don’t understand how you voted for him.”

Shrugging, Stearns politely smiled. “I can agree to disagree. I’m one of those kind of people.”

Trump Derangement Syndrome is real, and it’s not improving. And yes, it’s truly derangement:

BLUE STATE BLUES: Media, Politicians Gave Russia a Map of America’s Divisions.

SO MUCH FOR THE NARRATIVE: @SenFeinstein tells @jaketapper on #CNNSOTU that she has seen no evidence that the Trump campaign got “dirt” on Clinton from the Russians.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: 12 Steps to a Great Quickie Without the Kids Having a Clue. We find being empty-nesters works great. And we’re not the only ones; one of our friends was talking about her son being home from college for the summer and it was “I love to see him, but this is going to ruin our sex life!”

PROF. JACOBSON: My pro-free speech views made me the target of a smear campaign at Vassar College. “My lecture against squeezing out free speech from colleges got me smeared. The students who smeared me got a safe space complete with coloring books and markers.”

Suitable for their maturity level.

RICK MORAN HAS A ROUNDUP ON THAT TEXAS CHURCH SHOOTING. Bear in mind, of course, that as always early reports are incomplete and often wrong in important respects.

BARGAIN BASEMENT: New Nissan GT/R Starts Under $100,000.

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WELL, THIS COLUMN BY KURT SCHLICHTER WRITTEN JUST AFTER THE ELECTION CERTAINLY NAILED IT: Brace Yourself for Four Years of Nonstop Freakoutrage.

WEIRD, I THOUGHT ONLY ALT-RIGHT CONSPIRACY FREAKS WORRIED ABOUT SETH RICH: Donna Brazile Says She Was ‘Haunted’ by Murder of Seth Rich, Feared for Her Life.

A MASS SHOOTING at a Baptist church in Sutherland Springs, Texas. Not much other news yet.

IS THERE ANYTHING IT CAN’T DO? Study: Coffee may help kidney disease patients avoid early death.

PAJAMA BOY SUGGESTS WE’D BETTER FIGURE OUT HOW TO DO IT FAST: Can Birth Control Hormones Be Filtered From The Water Supply?

SCIENCE: Young Blood Safe and Just Might Help Alzheimer’s Patients. “The team at Stanford University found that infusions of plasma from healthy young men didn’t hurt the 18 Alzheimer’s patients who got them. And a few of the patients seemed to do a little better in the skills of everyday living, although memory and thinking skills were not affected. This does not mean that blood transfusions could treat Alzheimer’s disease, researchers cautioned. The study is a very long way from showing that. But it does show it’s worth going forward with more tests, said Dr. Sharon Sha, who ran the test program at Stanford.”

I’d be interested to see if you get a better result with whole blood.

OUCH: Vin Scully: “I will never watch another NFL game.” “I used to love, during the fall and winter, to watch the NFL on Sunday. And it’s not that I’m some great patriot. I was in the Navy for a year. Didn’t go anywhere. Didn’t do anything. But I have overwhelming respect and admiration for anyone who puts on a uniform and goes to war. So the only thing I can do in my little way is not to preach. I will never watch another NFL game.”