EASING THE PAIN:  Science is increasingly revealing that commonly used pain relievers such as acetaminophen (Tylenol) and ibuprofen (Motrin/Advil) can effect not only one’s perception of physical pain, but emotional pain as well.  A recent study shows that acetaminophen blunts positive emotions and emotional response generally.  Similar research has shown that ibuprofen (Motrin/Advil) reduces emotional stress among women but amplifies the emotional response of men.  So if you are feeling blue, some suggest trying a Tylenol or Advil before resorting to prescription anti-depressants or anti-anxiety drugs.

RELATED:  Staring into Fido’s eyes releases the feel-good brain chemical oxytocin, which creates feelings of love.  I knew that from staring into my dog, Thomas Jefferson’s, big brown eyes.  Somehow I don’t get the same emotions when I stare into my cat’s eyes, though she rarely stares back.  The sound of purring seems to make me happy, though.

MARIJUANA DEBATE HEATS UP:  After an extensive 5-day fact-finding hearing,  a federal judge in California yesterday ruled that it is not “irrational”–and thus does not offend the Constitution– for marijuana to be classified as a Schedule I drug (no legal uses) under the federal Controlled Substances Act (CSA).  It is a blow to pro-marijuana advocates, who’ve had remarkable success in getting pot approved for medicinal use, and–in four states–even recreational use.  Many legal experts anticipated that the judge, an Obama appointee, would take a “bold stand” and rule that marijuana cannot be completely banned under Schedule I. She suggested (showing remarkable restraint for an Obama appointee) that, as an unelected federal judge, it was not her place to effect such a substantial national policy change.

President Obama (technically, the Attorney General) could, consistent with the CSA, reschedule marijuana by executive order.  But for some reason, on this issue, the President has thus far refused to get out his infamous pen and phone, stating recently that he thinks Congress should amend the CSA to reschedule marijuana instead.

And in perhaps the ultimate irony, the Supreme Court ruled in its 2005 decision, Gonzales v. Raich, that individuals who used medical marijuana pursuant to state compassionate use laws were not entitled to a constitutional exemption from the CSA, as the CSA is the supreme law of the land.

Based on Gonzales, in late December, Oklahoma and Nebraska filed a lawsuit in the Supreme Court against Colorado, asserting that Colorado’s legalization of recreational pot has forced such neighboring States to bear the brunt of increased criminal activity, such as transportation of pot into their jurisdictions, where pot remains illegal under State law.  The interesting legal questions posed by the Oklahoma/Nebraska suit is whether state pot legalization conflicts with the CSA and is thus preempted, and if relatedly, whether the executive branch has a constitutional obligation to enforce the CSA’s prohibition in such states.  Some argue yes; some argue no.

THE ENLIGHTENMENT WAS MORE ENLIGHTENED THAN I REALIZED:  Polish archaeologists find an 18th century sex toy made of leather and wood (and I must say, judging by the picture, rather large).  Hope the ladies (or men?) didn’t get splinters.

FINALLY, A CHAMPION FOR ORDINARY FOLK AND A CRUSADER AGAINST POLITICAL CORRUPTION!:   . . . which is (more than ironically) what Hillary Clinton is billing herself as.  In her recent Iowa appearance, Clinton revealed these two themes as the basis upon which she’s shaping 2016 presidential bid.

She complained that chief executives make too much money, and of the horror that has befallen politics after the Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United–which stands for the unremarkable position that groups of people organized in a business (e.g., corporations)  or association (e.g., unions or neighborhood associations) form still have a First Amendment right to free speech.

All of this is coming from a woman whose persona is defined by whose massive political fundraising, multiple ethical lapses, and laughable claims of poverty.  I would call Clinton a hypocrite, but somehow this word fails to capture fully the Orwellian nature of her behavior.  How do Democrat voters let her get away with such obvious doublethink? In the Words of Orwell, in the novel 1984:

In a way, the world-view of the Party imposed itself most successfully on people incapable of understanding it. They could be made to accept the most flagrant violations of reality, because they never fully grasped the enormity of what was demanded of them, and were not sufficiently interested in public events to notice what was happening. By lack of understanding they remained sane. They simply swallowed everything, and what they swallowed did them no harm, because it left no residue behind, just as a grain of corn will pass undigested through the body of a bird.

Ignorance is strength, I guess.

RELATED:  Liberal/progressive groups are urging President Obama to issue an executive order to require government contractors to disclose their donor lists, in direct contravention to the Supreme Court’s decision in NAACP v. Alabama (1958), which held that compelled disclosure of the NAACP’s membership lists was unconstitutional because it created a chilling effect on the First Amendment right to free association.  And we know what liberals/progressives like to do when they find out the names of conservative donors, and it ain’t pretty.

This is all part of the liberal/progressive campaign against so-called “dark money,” which is an incredibly misleading phrase (there’s Orwell again) that refers to political spending by outside groups (i.e., not the political parties or candidates themselves).  An FEC rule requiring broader disclosure was tossed out of court in November, with the federal judge calling the FEC’s attempt “arbitrary, capricious, and contrary to law.”

So much for liberals/progressives belief in “privacy” or “free speech”– that stuff doesn’t apply to other people.

JUST IGNORE ‘EM!:   What is it about progressives that makes them think it is good for society to ignore the rule of law?  The latest iteration comes in the form of explicit calls to ignore the Supreme Court whenever it rules the “wrong” (i.e., non-progressive) way.

Because the Supreme Court isn’t presently dominated by progressives and none of the 5 current, right-of-center Justices are likely to retire before the end of the Obama Administration, progressives are now trying to create acceptability for the idea of “ignoring” the Court.  A recent New York Times op-ed by William Baude, for example, asserted that if the Court’s King v. Burwell opinion ultimately denies Obamacare subsidies to individuals states without state-run health insurance exchanges, the Obama Administration should only enforce the decision against the 4 named plaintiffs in the case.

For everyone else, Baude suggests that the Administration pretend that the law hasn’t technically been decided.  The justification for such lawlessness?:  “If the administration believes that a Supreme Court loss would be egregious and disastrous, it ought to consider taking the political heat to limit it.”   Oh, okay– that makes sense.  If the President thinks the Supreme Court’s interpretation of a law is “egregious and disastrous,” he should just ignore it for everyone but the named plaintiffs who brought the suit.

Apparently, Baude is channeling the progressive mindset.  A Feb. 2015 Rasmussen poll revealed that only 35% of Democrats disagreed when asked: “Should the president have the right to ignore federal court rulings if they are standing in the way of actions he feels are important for the country?”  81% of Republicans and 67% of voters not affiliated with either major party disagreed– an astounding difference of 32 to 46 percentage points from the Democrat perspective.

RELATED:  The Obama Administration has been notoriously disrespectful of courts, having been threatened with contempt for perjury in the ongoing lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Obama’s immigration executive orders and actually held the Department of Interior in contempt for its behavior ignoring the court’s preliminary injunction in a offshore drilling case.

And let’s not forget that President Obama’s own remarks bullying the Supreme Court prior to its big summer 201 Obamacare decision, NFIB v. Sebelius, triggered a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit to order a DOJ lawyer to provide an explanation– of at least 3 pages, single-spaced– articulating the DOJ’s position on the propriety of judicial review of the constitutionality of laws.  Holder provided the letter— only 2 1/2 pages long, defiantly enough–and used wishy-washy language that only minimally acknowledged judicial review and lectured the court on its limited role.

CONGRESS VERSUS THE IRANIAN PARLIAMENT:  . . . and the Iranian Parliament seems to win.  Today, the Nuclear Committee of the Iranian Parliament issued a strange “factsheet” on the nuclear deal, which seems to contradict virtually every material aspect of the P5+1 Geneva Agreement, as conveyed by the Obama Administration.  In particular, the factsheet states that Iran agrees to only a 5-year deal (not 10-year); will be allowed to continue enriching uranium to 20% (weapons grade) if “needed”; won’t agree to shut down the Arak Heavy Water Reactor (which supplies plutonium necessary for bomb-making); and of course all Iranian sanctions must be terminated immediately, and in one single step.

Would Iran like fries with that agreement?

Meanwhile, back in the Bat Cave… the Senate Foreign Relations Committee yesterday unanimously passed a toothless Corker-Menendez bill that appears to have a veto-proof majority.  After veto-proof congressional approval became inevitable, President Obama magnanimously said he wouldn’t bother to veto the bill.

Under the revised Corker-Menendez, Congress would only have 30 days to reject the Iranian deal; if it fails to do anything (which would not be surprising), the deal goes into effect, with the tacit approval of Congress.  And Congress also caved on the terrorism language of the bill, which used to require the President to certify, every 90 days, that Iran was not supporting terrorism against Americans (or the sanctions could be re-imposed).  That is now gone, an apparently disposable byproduct of garnering Democrat votes.

Wow– way to go, Congress.  You are negotiating away your constitutional prerogative to lift the sanctions you imposed via statute (and/or for 2/3 Senate ratification of treaties), in return for a mere 30-day window of consideration of a deal that the Iranians are already saying they won’t abide by.  This is what happens when a President successfully bullies Article I– Congress eventually gets the courage to feign a modicum of self-respect, but is so afraid that the President will “go around” them anyway (as he is wont to do) that it ends up giving the President its lunch money.

WHEN LOVE ISN’T FREE:  An organization representing prostitutes in California (yes, you read that right) has filed a lawsuit in a federal district court in San Francisco, arguing that the Supreme Court’s substantive due process “liberty” decisions–which protect the right of consenting adults to engage in sex in private–also protect the right of consenting adults to pay for sex.  If it’s legal to have sex, the plaintiffs argue, how can it be illegal to pay for it?  And relatedly they argue:  If a person can pay for dinner, wine, roses and other items as a prelude to sex, why not just offer to pay the sexual partner cash instead?

This kind of litigation was predictable after the Court’s decision in Lawrence v. Texas (recognizing the liberty of consenting adults to engage in private, homosexual sodomy), though the Lawrence Court did explicitly note that the case didn’t involve sex-for-hire.   Justice Scalia’s dissent in Lawrence presciently predicted that it would open the floodgates to challenges of traditional marriage laws, prostitution, polygamy, and even incest.

In August, a federal trial judge in Utah struck down that state’s polygamy ban, concluding that it violated the 1st Amendment free exercise of religion rights of the “Sister Wives” polygamist TV show family.  Ruling on First Amendment grounds, however, is much narrower than on substantive due process “liberty” grounds.  So the question remains:  Do the rest of us–who aren’t particularly religious–have a constitutional right to polygamy?  Stay tuned– a lesbian “throuple” (3 persons) in Massachusetts is openly defying that state’s anti-polygamy law, claiming a right to polygamy.  

Polygamy aside, if we have a constitutional liberty to have sex, do we have a corresponding liberty to pay for sex?  Arguably, yes.  After all, doesn’t criminalization of prostitution demean the humanity and dignity of a person who has no romantic sexual partner? Or whose partner is physically unable to have sex with him/her?  Must that person seek out an adulterous or other third party “romantic” relationship, when all he/she really wants is sex?

One possibility the courts may use to distinguish prostitution is that it involves “commercialization” of sex, which is a distinction that still justifies legal prohibition of the sale/distribution of obscenity, but simultaneously allows individuals to consume/possess obscene materials in the privacy of their own home (Stanley v. Georgia).   But then again, if prostitution occurs in private– and particularly, in a private home (as opposed to a commercial establishment, such as a brothel), one would think the privacy-of-the-home rationale of Stanley could similarly grant constitutional protection to in-home prostitution.

Should the courts be “constitutionalizing” these sexual activities, or allow the political process to play out?  One state, Nevada, has statutorily allowed prostitution in certain places, pursuant to state regulation.

Being a libertarian, I see the policy arguments for enacting statutes like Nevada’s.  But being a constitutionalist, I think there are some democratic dangers to giving unelected federal judges the power to constitutionalize every “liberty” claim, which cuts short the political debate inherent with legislative change.  And the mother in me (which is inherently conservative) –with a teenage daughter– gets a little worried when I think of a world in which prostitution and polygamy are legal.  The times, they are a-changin.’

HILLARY’S BIG IRON HOSTILITY:   And no, I’m not talking about her, um, relationship with Bill.  Jacob Sullum at Reason documents Hillary’s steady history of anti-gun comments.

Maybe she just needs someone to buy her a nice pink .45 revolver, like this cutie pie?

WHAT’S THE REAL DEAL WITH CORKER-MENENDEZ?  Is it a congressional cop out, because it cedes  Senatorial power to ratify treaties  (by 2/3 supermajority)? Or is the treaty power irrelevant, because the bill merely modifies the President’s authority, under existing statutes, to waive Iranian sanctions, thus requiring only majority approval by both houses (and possibly 2/3 of both houses, in the event of a presidential veto)?

And if Congress can somehow get Corker-Menendez enacted, would it bind the President, or would he be free to ignore it, claiming his own, independent Article II authority to negotiate “executive agreements” with other nations?

My own opinion, FWIW, is that any modification of statutorily-imposed sanctions on Iran (and there are many) would require amendment to those statutes, which is what Corker-Menendez seeks to accomplish.  I am deeply concerned, however, that Obama will veto Corker-Menendez, Congress won’t have the votes to override, and Obama will (once again) act unilaterally, claiming broadly worded waiver provisions in existing statutes give him the authority to lift sanctions in his discretion.   He will then support a UN Security Council resolution lifting sanctions (with little to no verification regime).  Once this is done, the US will have little practical ability to back out, as Iran will have the “blessing” and cover of the world community/international law.

No one could stop the President under this scenario, btw, unless courts are willing to recognize congressional standing to sue the President when he fails to faithfully execute Congress’s statutes.

Or maybe, as this (idiotic) political science professor asserts, Corker-Menendez is “counterproductive to foreign policy success”? Well, geez, why have a Congress at all if they’re always standing in the way of presidential desires? We might as well just adjourn Congress permanently.  It’s so, like, 1787.

WISCONSIN VOTERS FIGHT BACK:  A group of 5 Wisconsin voters just filed a motion to dismiss Wisconsin Supreme Court Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson’s federal lawsuit, in which she frivolously asserts that she has a constitutionally protected “property interest” in her position as Chief Justice– that Wisconsin voters “deprived” her of by enacting a state constitutional amendment.

The amendment expresses the will of Wisconsin voters that their state supreme court’s Chief Justice should be selected by the 7 court justices, and term-limited to 2 years.  It is widely speculated that, pursuant to this new amendment, the 7 justices of the Wisconsin Supreme Court (the majority of whom are conservative) will select another Chief, leaving Abrahamson (an outspoken liberal) on the court as an “ordinary” justice.  Call the cops– this constitutional deprivation must be stopped!

Abrahamson’s intense desire to remain as Chief Justice has caused her to behave erratically.  Her complaint asserts, for example, that the amendment shouldn’t take effect until the expiration of her 10-year term, in 2019. But this directly contradicts an opinion she penned for the Wisconsin Supreme Court in 2002, in which she declared, “[U]nless a constitutional amendment provides otherwise, it takes effect upon the certification of a statewide canvass of the votes.”

RELATED:  Abrahamson’s zeal also may get herself into ethics trouble, as she declared on April 6, under penalty of perjury, that voters had approved the amendment.  The amendment, however, was not approved by Wisconsin voters until April 7.  This may sound like a technicality, but it is an ethical lapse, in which she swore to the truth of various facts that did not actually exist at the time.  At a minimum, it shows she is a very sloppy lawyer.

Stay tuned:  Wisconsin politics–even in the judicial branch–are notoriously entertaining and, er, robust.

THANKS, GLENN, AND SO LONG INSTAPUNDIT VOTARIES:   I’m grateful for the chance to have another shot at helping navigate the USS Instapundit.  She’s quite a beauty.  And as usual, it’s been a fun, wild ride.  :)

I hope to see some of you over at my Facebook page, or you can keep track of me on my website.

Thanks to all my fabulous co-bloggers and InstaP fans– love you all.  <3

WELL, WE WOULDN’T WANT TO “OFFEND” ANYONE!:  Rand Paul tells the NY Slimes that he thinks the GOP is going “too crazy” over voter ID and “offending people.”  So I guess using this logic, the GOP should stop opposing affirmative action, abortion, supporting traditional marriage, or taking any other conservative position that might “offend” liberals/progressives.   Puh-leeze.

THE WISCONSIN GESTAPO:   George Will’s latest column is a terrific condemnation of the Gestapo tactics used by the prosecutors pursuing a “John Doe” investigation of conservative issue advocacy groups in Wisconsin:

Wisconsin’s sordid episode began, appropriately, with a sound of tyranny — fists pounding on the doors of private citizens in pre-dawn raids. While sheriff’s deputies used floodlights to illuminate the citizens’ homes, armed raiders seized documents, computers, cellphones and other devices. . . .

Liberals inveighing against “dark money” in politics mean money contributed anonymously to finance political advocacy. Donors’ anonymity thwarts liberals’ efforts to injure the livelihoods of identifiable conservatives by punishing them for their political participation and thereby deterring others from participating.

O’Keefe’s persecution illustrates the problem his lawyer David Rivkin calls “dark power” — government power wielded secretively for vengeance and intimidation.

There is literally no reason to treat conservative groups who engage in “issue advocacy”– i.e., talking about issues they believe are important–as common criminals, busting down their doors in the middle of the night with battering rams and scaring their families.  There was no reason any searches of computers or papers could not have been conducted in daylight, when the kids were at school.  The only reason to use these tactics was to intimidate.  This fact alone reveals the true purpose of this investigation:  to use a special Wisconsin law, allowing secretive and broad investigatory power to intimidate vocal conservative groups in the state and chill/stop them from exercising their First Amendment rights.  This is a disgusting abuse of power and I hope, once this civil rights action is adjudicated on the merits, that the prosecutors are forced to pay for their abuse of power, not only financially, but with a loss of their licenses to practice law.

WHERE DID MALAYSIAN FLIGHT 370 GO?:  According to this fascinating piece in The Atlantic, Inmarsat’s data suggesting that the plane went south toward the wide open Indian Ocean seems implausible:

Until officials provide more information, the claim that Flight 370 went south rests not on the weight of mathematics but on faith in authority. Inmarsat officials and search authorities seem to want it both ways: They release charts, graphics, and statements that give the appearance of being backed by math and science, while refusing to fully explain their methodologies. And over the course of this investigation, those authorities have repeatedly issued confident pronouncements that they’ve later quietly walked back.

The biggest risk to the investigation now is that authorities continue to assume they’ve finally found the area where the plane went down, while failing to explore other possibilities simply because they don’t fit with a mathematical analysis that may not even hold up.

After all, searchers have yet to find any hard evidence—not so much as a shred of debris—to confirm that they’re looking in the right ocean.

Read the whole thing.  I personally believe Lt. General Thomas McInerney, who has claimed he has intelligence sources that have confirmed the plane landed in Pakistan. 

BRINGING (OVERDUE) BALANCE TO PRESIDENTIAL DEBATES:  RNC Chair Reince Preibus has announced that the RNC is taking steps to demand greater balance in the 2016 presidential debates, including selection of more moderators and journalists on the questioning panels.

Let’s hope the RNC sticks to its guns on this because we all remember the Candy Crowley debacle, when she interjected herself inappropriately to defend Obama’s position on Benghazi.  The only good thing about the Crowley Affair is that it may have given the GOP a reason to demand fair play in these important debates.

LIBERAL LITMUS TESTS:   Michael Boggs, an Obama nominee for the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, is facing stiff opposition from liberal groups because– gasp!– he expressed support for traditional marriage and adoption (over abortion), the latter of which earned him NARAL’s label “dangerous for women.”

Can’t we please just pick our federal judges based on a strong academic record, solid experience and accomplishments, an understanding the proper judicial role, and maybe even an attitude of open-mindedness?  Judges are not supposed to be politicians, and the more we act as though they are, the more we’ll be left with only ideologues (politicians in robes) on the bench, particularly now that the Senate filibuster is gone.

SEGREGATION IS COOL . . . IF IT’S LIBERAL:   Mike Adams at Townhall discusses how UNC-Wilimington Chancellor Gary Miller has bragged about university programs that are for blacks only and a special graduation ceremony for LGBT students.

This is disgusting balkanization, of course, but it’s been going on in higher ed for years.  I recently received an announcement from the Association of American Law Schools (AALS)–the chief trade organization for US law schools and faculty– for its annual “Workshop for Pretenured People of Color Law School Teachers.”  In the “who should attend” section, it declares, “The workshop will be of interest to newly appointed people of color law school teachers as well as junior professors who are navigating the tenure process and looking for guidance and support.”   There is no similar workshop for pretenured people of non-color (I’ve never really been sure what a person “of color” means, but I’m pretty sure it’s designed to contrast to “whites,” whom I surmise aren’t perceived by some to have any “color”).

The AALS also maintains a separate directory of minority law teachers and a special Section on Minority Groups.

I guess the bottom line is that racial segregation (and probably sexual orientation segregation) is “cool” if it’s done in the name of “diversity.”

RUNAWAY CORPORATIONS: The problem of corporations fleeing the U.S. for more tax-friendly venues is the topic of today’s Wall Street Journal op-ed by my former boss, Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), the Chair of the Senate Finance Committee. Wyden pledges to engage in a bipartisan effort to reform the tax code, which he asserts must include both a lowering of the corporate tax rate as well as plugging of corporate tax loopholes.

Normally, I’d be skeptical of Democrat overtures on tax reform.  But having worked for Wyden in the past, I know he’s a straight shooter and is genuinely interested in accomplishing bipartisan consensus.  I hope the Republicans are willing to reach across the aisle and work with him; it’s a rare opportunity to get something done.

A PEN, A PHONE, AND SOLAR PANELS ON THE WHITE HOUSE:   Seriously.  The Obama Administration is preparing to bypass Congress–again— and issue a slew of Executive Orders to fight global warming “climate change.”  Michael Bastasch over at Daily Caller reports:

Obama will order executive agencies to push a slew of new programs to promote solar power, green jobs training and subsidize investing in energy efficient appliances and equipment. Obama will also announce a plan to complete solar panel installations on the roof of the White House.

The president will make his announcement Friday at a Wal-Mart in Mountain View, California and outline 300 “private and public sector commitments” to reduce carbon dioxide, which is released into the atmosphere through the burning of hydrocarbons and through natural processes.

When will Congress start defending its constitutional prerogative to make the laws?

HIGHER EDUCATION “SAY WHAT!?” ALERT:   George Leef has another great column over at Forbes.  This time he explains how Uncle Sam’s Obama-inspired “generosity” approach to student loan policies not only encourages more debt but also low-paying, public sector work.

All I’m going to say is that I put myself through law school using student loans, and I will pay them off sometime this year (!)  Equity aside, the feds weren’t so  “generous” to me; I didn’t have  loans “forgiven” because I took a relatively low-paying job as a law professor.  Somehow, through prudence and hard work, I’ve managed to pay my debt back and have a comfortable life.  And if they had offered such forgiveness, I would have felt like a loser.  “Generosity” like this is often perceived by the capable as a handout to the incapable.  To borrow a phrase from Frederick Douglass, “your interference is doing [] a positive injury.”

HOUSE GOP GOVERNING BY MINORITY?:   Once again, Speaker John Boehner violates the “Hastert Rule,” a mode of governing adopted by former GOP Speaker Dennis Hastert that says floor votes should not be taken unless the Speaker is confident he has the support of the “majority of the majority.”  Without such support, the Speaker inherently relies on the minority party to pass legislation, not his own majority.  Yesterday, Boehner allowed the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) reauthorization to pass without the support of a majority of Republicans.  Conservatives opposed OPIC as a “corporate welfare” agency because it subsidizes U.S. companies’ investments in foreign countries.

Why on earth would we subsidize that???

UNDERMINING INSPECTORS GENERAL:   Inspectors General (IGs) exist in every federal agency and their job is to uncover corruption, waste, and fraud.  As this Washington Times editorial establishes, IGs are under attack in the Obama Administration, which doesn’t have much tolerance for “inspection” by anyone.

THE WEALTH TRANSFER TROJAN HORSE:  I’m talking about global warming “climate change” (a mighty convenient moniker), of course.  The White House’s newly released National Climate Assessment contains the usual Gorean “the sky is falling!” exclamations.  But as the Wall Street Journal points out,

[T]he report has the feel of that infomercial footage of the people who can’t crack an egg or perform routine household tasks until they acquire this or that as-seen-on-TV product. The cautious findings of serious empirical climate literature are so obviously exaggerated and colored that the document is best understood as a political tract with a few scientific footnotes.

For instance, the report’s “overview” summary asserts that “extreme weather events with links to climate change have become more frequent and/or intense,” climate change is already “disrupting people’s lives,” and “this evidence tells an unambiguous story.” Good thing we’ve been building that ark in the backyard.

But the fine print that few will ever read acknowledges the real uncertainties of something as complex as the planet’s atmosphere. “There has been no universal trend in the overall extent of drought across the continental U.S. since 1900,” the authors observe. We also learn that “trends in severe storms, including the intensity and frequency of tornadoes, hail, and damaging thunderstorm winds, are uncertain and are being studied intensively.” And so on.

But hey, why are those pesky conservatives so insistent on “facts, facts, facts” all the time (Benghazi, IRS, global warming climate change, etc., etc.)???  Don’t they realize that all that really matters is achieving “justice,” as defined by Democrats, and thus inevitably involves massive taxation or spending (i.e., wealth transfer)?  Geez.

ANOTHER SICKENING CHARLIE CRIST LIE:  Republican-turned-Democrat Florida gubernatorial candidate Charlie Crist says he left the GOP because of race:

“I couldn’t be consistent with myself and my core beliefs, and stay with a party that was so unfriendly toward the African-American president, I’ll just go there,” Crist said. “I was a Republican and I saw the activists and what they were doing, it was intolerable to me.”

As Chris Cilliza points out in today’s Washington Post, “Um, not exactly.”  Christ is pandering to his new Democrat constituency, which demands at least one prominent, public confession of guilt about racism.  Crist is the epitome of what’s wrong with politics today, and Democrat politics in particular.  He’s just yucky.

WHO LET THE DOGS OUT?:  The Obama Administration.  The Wall Street Journal’s Daniel Henninger documents the Obama unabashed, full-court press to end free speech, aided by far left/Marxist university faculty and their indoctrinated students.  It is kind of beautiful that universities are feeling the Administration’s wrath.  But instead of fighting back, expect university administrators to cave and lick the Great Leader’s shoes.