THE #METOO MOMENT DIDN’T LAST LONG: Congressional Hispanic Caucus to Keep Dem Rep as Chair of PAC Despite Sexual Assault Allegations. “The Congressional Hispanic Caucus will not call on Democratic Rep. Tony Cárdenas (Calif.) to step down as chairman of its political action committee following allegations that he assaulted a then-16-year-old girl in 2007. . . . Earlier this month, Cárdenas identified himself as the unnamed ‘John Doe’ in a lawsuit filed in Los Angeles in late April. The complaint alleges that, in 2007, an ‘elected politician’ sexually battered and assaulted a 16-year-old girl. Under California law, the civil suit cannot name the accuser or the alleged assailant.”

DEM POLITICO WILLIE BROWN: Trump is more popular than Dems want to admit. “Like it or not, a significant number of Americans are actually happy these days. They are making money. They feel safe, and they agree with with the president’s protectionist trade policies, his call for more American jobs, even his immigration stance. The jobs growth reports, the North Korea summit and the steady economy are beating out the Stormy Daniels scandal and the Robert Mueller investigation in Middle America, hands down. So you are not going to win back the House by making it all about him. Rather than stoking the base by attacking Trump, Democrats need to come up with a platform that addresses the average voters’ hopes and concerns. Not just the needs of underdogs or whatever cause happens to be the media flavor of the week. Democrats need to look like the adults, not like another pack of screaming kids on the playground.”

Yep, that’s all they need to do. And so far, they can’t even do that.

SARAH HUCKABEE SANDERS IS ASKED IF SHE’D RATHER DEAL WITH KINDERGARTENERS OR JIM ACOSTA. HER ANSWER IS GOLD.

Related: Sanders shares adorable photo for Mother’s Day. (And is that a subtle dig at CNN?)

OPEN THREAD: Did anything happen today?

A LOT OF PEOPLE SEEM TO FEEL THAT NATIONAL REVIEW IS DROPPING THE BALL LATELY: Mytheos Holt: Conservatism’s Flirtation with Feminism is Suicidal.

JERRY SEINFELD IS NOT INTERESTED IN TRUMP JOKES.

Perhaps he simply wants to keep a sizable audience. It’s likely not a coincidence that as Robin Williams became hyper-politicized in his standup act, the audiences for his movies shrunk dramatically, as he went from blockbusters like Good Morning Vietnam and Aladdin to indie flicks “each one a far cry from the Hollywood features he had once thrived on, and which were lucky to receive even a theatrical release,” as Vanity Fair notes in its haunting new article, “Inside the Final Days of Robin Williams.”

Related: Seven Ways Saturday Night Live Can Recover From Its ‘Limousine Liberal’ Agenda.

RIP: LONGTIME NFL COACH CHUCK KNOX DEAD AT 86. “Knox compiled a record of 186-147-1 in 22 seasons with the Rams, Seahawks and Buffalo Bills. Nicknamed ‘Ground Chuck’ due to his run-first offenses, Knox was named NFL Coach of the Year three times — in 1973, 1980 and 1984.”

ALL THE PROBLEMS AT NBC NEWS AREN’T JUST COINCIDENCE. THEY’RE SYMPTOMS.

When NBC News decided last year that Ronan Farrow’s reporting on Harvey Weinstein wasn’t solid enough to air, or even to keep pursuing, that could have been a too-timid-but-well-intentioned editorial decision. (NBC is quick to note that he was a freelancer and was not working for the network exclusively at the time.)

But it turned out to be a blunder for the ages — akin to Decca Records rejecting the Beatles — considering that Farrow went on to win a Pulitzer Prize for reporting on Harvey Weinstein begun at NBC but brought to fruition at the New Yorker. And it reminded some observers of NBC’s failure to deliver its own scoop in 2016 when The Washington Post broke the news that Donald Trump could be heard bragging about sexual assault on an NBC “Access Hollywood” recording.

I’m not sure if that’s at all an apt comparison to Decca passing on the Beatles. Dick Rowe, the executive who rejected them made up for his disaster by signing the Rolling Stones, who quickly became nearly as big of a cash cow for Decca as the Beatles were to EMI. I don’t see any signs of NBC’s news division regaining the trust of half of the country anytime soon.

WELL, THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY, YOU KNOW: This Mesmerising New Video Shows The Churning Motion of Jupiter’s Clouds.

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MARK STEYN AT THE MOVIES: Voyage to Disaster.

If any scene sums up the disaster-movie genre it’s Shelley Winters (a great actress fallen among high-concept sharks) swimming underwater through a flooded corridor in The Poseidon Adventure, her cheeks puffed out like a blowfish, dress billowing up over flailing thighs. Newsweek ungallantly observed that she’s “plump enough these days to sink an ocean liner all by herself”, but Miss Winters declared that “I put on all this weight for the movie!” and her deal required the studio to pay for post-shooting sessions at a fat farm. If they did, they deserved a refund. Shelley stayed Poseidon-sized and (just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water) resurfaced in Tentacles, in which she got the better of a giant squid.

Unlike Shelley, the disaster movie itself shriveled away to nothing. It was the only new film genre to emerge from the 1970s, at least until Spielberg and Lucas inaugurated the age of the stand-alone summer blockbuster at the end of the decade.

Read the whole thing.

THEY WOULDN’T DO THAT … WOULD THEY? Yes, they would and they are, according to former House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif. The “they” here are the Department of Justice officials who Issa claims are “lying through their teeth” about their “slow-walking” responses to congressional document requests and subpoena in hopes they will be drowned by a blue wave in November.

AN AMERICAN IN PARIS:  The Logan Act seems silly to me.  But when Trump is suspected of violating it, the FBI swings into action.  When John Kerry violates it by meeting with Iranian “diplomats” in Paris , nothing happens. (And arguably he’s made it a practice of violating it since 1970).

There is a lesson that extends far beyond the Logan Act here:  When law enforcement has a lot of discretion, it gets abused.  Sometimes this occurs because a legislature passes a statute that is intended to give law enforcement discretion.   Sometimes, on the other hand, the statute’s over-breadth isn’t obvious until well after it is passed, and prosecutorial discretion evolves from there.   And sometimes the law is arguably narrow and specific, but over time law enforcement comes to view it as unwise and hence enforces it only when it suits them for other reasons (arguably the Logan Act case).   Too much discretion leads to corruption.  And if it doesn’t ALWAYS happen, it’s close enough to always for government work.

A FRIEND WRITES THAT HE BACKSLID FROM HIS LOW-CARB DIET AND NOW HE’S FOLLOWING THIS APPROACH and it is, in his words “amazing.”

FORGET IT JACK, IT’S BALTIMORE-TOWN: Jack Dunphy: Baltimore Man Caught Being Obnoxious to Cop Won’t Resign From Police Oversight Committee.

Perhaps you say, “So what if he was double-parked? What’s the big deal?” And indeed double-parking is not a big deal in and of itself. But take note of the fact that Baltimore has just recorded its 100th homicide for the year, reaching that milestone at the second-fastest pace in a decade. Three of those homicides occurred within just a few blocks of where Mr. McKenstry and Sgt. McGowan had their little contretemps. I am a firm believer in the Broken Windows theory of policing, and Baltimore has no chance of reducing its homicide numbers if petty offenses like littering, public drinking, and, yes, double-parking, are ignored by its police officers. If Mr. McKenstry, and the others hoping to provide leadership and oversight to the police, fail to realize this, the blood that flows will be on their hands.

Read the whole thing.

TEDIOUS, BUT WELL-COMPENSATED:

I don’t know about Ta-Nehisi Coates, but I suspect that Coates does see himself as an artist — as a literary genius of some sort. Certainly Coates hears himself spoken of that way, and his prose style — to my eye — reflects that self-image. Coates has made race his template, his brutally repetitive message. His artistic freedom has moved him to continually say that black people are not free. He’s really not free to say anything else, is he? So he must say it about other artists, even as those other artists claim their freedom to say whatever they want too. Coates can only describe a prison. He can’t put anyone else in it. He can only invite them to perceive the prison and themselves inside it.

And his role, as I’ve noted before, is to serve as the intellectual jailer for other blacks, on behalf of the leftist political apparat. “Brutally” repetitive indeed.

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JOURNALISM: Howard Kurtz Slams Media Over Cohen Coverage: ‘Shocked to Discover That There’s Gambling in Casablanca.’ “The media are just shocked, SHOCKED to discover that there’s gambling in Casablanca, talking here about these big companies. It’s not––I’m not defending this practice, but DC is a swampy place. This has gone on for many, many administrations, where you hire someone who is a friend of somebody who’s high up in the White House or the President because you’re looking for access and somebody who can carry your message.”

Yep. Look at Vernon Jordan.

CHANGE: From Iraq to Yemen: Israel’s Eurovision Entry Draws Unexpected Support From the Arab World. Anything is possible in the Age Of Trump, it seems.