JOEL KOTKIN: Samuel Huntington was right — cultural and religious clashes are driving war today.

Yes, The Clash of Civilizations was unfortunately prescient. It would be a no-contest clash if the people running our civilization didn’t mostly hate it.

NCLA NEWS: NCLA Asks D.C. District Court to Halt Illegal Suspension of Hon. Pauline Newman.

Late yesterday, the New Civil Liberties Alliance filed a brief in Newman v. Moore, et al., urging the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to deny Defendants’ motion to dismiss the Hon. Pauline Newman’s complaint and to grant a preliminary injunction halting her ongoing suspension. Last month, the Judicial Council of the Federal Circuit unlawfully suspended the veteran circuit judge from hearing new cases for at least a year, after ordering her indefinite suspension several months earlier without due process.

Judge Newman’s indefinite removal from the bench is unprecedented in American judicial history. Throughout the process, the Judicial Council has changed the rationale for its actions and even altered the allegations leveled against her, all to accomplish a predetermined outcome. In March 2023, the Judicial Council indefinitely suspended Judge Newman from hearing new cases before any formal investigation began. In violation of basic and fundamental due process requirements, Chief Judge Moore and the Judicial Council refused to transfer the investigation to another circuit court of appeals, despite the fact that all members of the Judicial Council are fact witnesses to the events at the heart of the dispute. Three former Chief Judges (two from the Federal Circuit itself, and one from the Fifth Circuit) have publicly challenged the Judicial Council’s behavior.

The Judicial Council’s factually baseless and procedurally defective suspension of Judge Newman deprives her of the constitutional right and obligation to continue in office, and it violates the procedural due process protections built into the very statute and rules the Judicial Council is enforcing. The September order exceeds sanctions imposed on judges who committed serious misconduct and improprieties. The Council’s actions, which appear designed to accomplish a preordained result, have left Judge Newman with no remaining cases to hear, irreparably harming her and depriving the country of her decades of valuable judicial experience and insight.

Whatever is going on at the Federal Circuit, it smells.

PAID, NO DOUBT: Cornell professor who called Hamas attacks ‘exhilarating’ takes leave of absence: ‘I recognize that some of the language I used was reprehensible,’ professor wrote in apology letter.

I remember when higher education was defended as encouraging considered, informed thought.

I MEAN, HE’S NOT WRONG: Matt Taibbi: Amy Klobuchar, You Suck: The Minnesota Senator asks Amazon to censor Substack and Rumble. How much more of this can we take?

If your political program has to be protected from criticism by censorship, it sucks, and so do you for demanding censorship. And it’s not a question of how much we can take, but of how much we will take.

FRANK J. OUTTHINKS THE FOREIGN POLICY ESTABLISHMENT:

So Israel was reestablished in the 1940s because a bunch of people tried to murder the Jews and it expanded its territory in a war soon after where a bunch of countries tried to murder the Jews but Israel keeps having trouble with Gaza as a bunch of people there keep trying to…

— Frank J. Fleming (@IMAO_) October 25, 2023

JUSTICE: US District Court Judge Rules New York City’s Bruen Response Restrictions are Unconstitutional.

WHEN SILENCE SPEAKS VOLUMES: Companies have chosen to speak up on every issue imaginable. Now they are abstaining from condemning violence against civilians and providing public support to their Jewish employees.

THIS SORT OF THING SEEMS TO BE HAPPENING MORE OFTEN: 2 jets collide on Houston runway; one took off without permission.

Flashback: Airline Close Calls Happen Far More Often Than Previously Known.

ED MORRISSEY: Decolonize Academia Now!

The sickness that American higher education spreads through the use of public support has become too apparent to ignore. Beege will have a story in a little bit about how the worship of death-cult terrorism now literally appears on the walls of George Washington University while its administration offers no rebuke at all. On campuses across America — and not just at the college level — students march while chanting “From the river to the sea,” an explicit call for the annihilation of Israel and its so-called “colonizers.”

If it’s decolonization they want, then we should accommodate them. . . .

Rather than launch destructive campaigns that will undermine the rights of all Americans, we need to address the issue at its core. The issue isn’t the NSJP, or the current flock of moral idiots on American campuses at the moment. The problem is the firehose of federal tax dollars propping up the Higher Ed Industry, and the way it gets manipulated to transform education into the kind of indoctrination that produced this anti-Semitic Hitler Youth Movement.

In other words, we need to end the student loan programs. We need to end Pell grants, and every scholarship from the federal government, even the ones for left-handed Laplanders with Lyme Disease. We need to end the transmission of every federal dollar into the bloated, corrupt Academia as it exists now and has existed over the last several decades. Its main product has become a blizzard of non-performing administrators and crops of moral idiots, the latter of whom emerge with crippling lifetime debt and nihilist fantasies that many of of them will never outgrow.

To put it another way that might appeal to our progressive partners: We need to Defund the Fleece.

This violates no rights. It doesn’t dictate speech codes to college campuses, another point on which conservatives should know better than to impose. Not a single thing will change, except that we will finally kick the financial struts out from underneath a persistent parasite that has finally come close to achieving its goal of killing its host.

Colleges and universities can still operate how they wish, as they should. But they will no longer have an income stream from federally backed student loans, and that means they will no longer be able to afford to operate with impunity. When the student loans stop, the student stream will as well — and it will suddenly matter who’s on the payroll, and just how much tuition they can charge in a market where pricing signals have been fully restored.

That in itself will provide a certain amount of clarity.

Clarity is the theme, lately.

A SMALL MEASURE OF ACCOUNTABILITY: DC Court issues criminal summons to Rep. Bowman for pulling fire alarm.

DO TELL: The Far Left has a serious antisemitism problem. And not just the “far” left.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: UC Berkeley Reverses Instructor’s Attempt to Give Extra Credit for Pro-Palestinian Political Activity.

WELL, THEY’RE MORE INTO COSTUMES, AS A RULE: “In the past, libertarians have had about as much influence in the GOP as the Log Cabin Republicans, without nearly as good Halloween parties. That’s changing.”

EVERYTHING IS GOING SWIMMINGLY: Biden’s minimalist Middle East policy is a stunning failure.

Caught off-guard by the stunning and savage Hamas attacks into Israel and unprepared for the resultant chaos, the Biden administration now faces a Middle East at war and on the brink of a catastrophe.

Despite denying any involvement in the attack, Iran’s Ayatollah Khamenei openly praised Hamas for it and suggested that a bloody Israeli ground invasion into Gaza may trigger Iranian entry into the fighting. Iran’s foreign minister darkly warned of a multi-front regional war against Israel. Meanwhile, tensions mount and rockets fly along Israel’s northern border as fears grow of an attack into Israel by Lebanese Hezbollah. . . .

After years of pulling forces out of the region, the Pentagon is now rushing to put them back. In response to the Israel-Hamas war, the Pentagon dispatched two aircraft carrier strike groups. One of them, the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower, was slated to participate in a NATO exercise, but has now been diverted from Europe toward the Middle East.

This will end well.

THE GENITALS OF TOMORROW: “Will technology give us options that are artistic and creative? Do we have to stick to penis and vagina norms? Can we have genitalia that look like flowers? Or abstract sculpture? It’s all terribly exciting.”

THE ENEMY WITHIN: Eventbrite Blocks Riley Gaines — But OKs Pro-Hamas Events.

THE LEFT REVEALS ITSELF: Anti-Semitic Nuts are Coming Out of the Woodwork in California, New York.

Related (from Glenn): Cooper Union Jewish Students Locked in Library by Security for Protection against Angry Protestors.

In a just society, the “angry protestors” would be the ones in need of protection.

HMM: 22 killed, dozens wounded in shootings at several locations in Lewiston, Maine: As many as 60 people were injured after a man shot at several locations, including a bowling alley in Lewiston, Maine, according to four law enforcement sources.

The pictures are suggestive, but there’s no real info yet on who did it. “Police believe they know who the shooting suspect is,” but no information has been released. It’s disappointing that no one seems to have returned fire.

NOT WHEN THE PEOPLE RUNNING THE COUNTRY HAVE CONTEMPT FOR IT: There’ll Always Be an England? Since October 7, prospects are looking worse than ever.

ACLU: ACLU: Giving People HIV Intentionally Is No Big Deal.

OPEN THREAD: Hump day.

I HOPE XI IS WORRIED ABOUT A COUP: Ministers’ Sacking Shows Cracks in China’s Leadership: Chinese defense minister, ex foreign minister fall from grace amidst Sino-US tensions.

As I’ve said before, though, I worry it’s like Japan getting rid of all the war opponents before starting WWII.

ONCE A PLANET OF RIVERS: Curiosity rover discovers new evidence Mars once had ‘right conditions’ for life.

WHEN PEOPLE ARE TRYING TO GET LAID, LAWS ARE JUST SUGGESTIONS. INCLUDING THE LAWS OF PHYSICS. Scientists Caught Sperm Defying One of The Major Laws of Physics.

LESBIANISM IS HARAM: Columbia University lesbian group disinvites ‘Zionists’ from movie night.

With the conflict in Gaza raging, an organization called LionLez sent out a message to students promoting an on-campus “Black Lesbian Film” event said explicitly said no “Zionists” would be welcome to attend.

“It’s FREE PALESTINE over here. Zionists aren’t invited. See you soon, Lion Lez,” read the promotion for the Friday night showing of the two flicks, including one called “Shakedown” which “chronicles explicit performances in an underground lesbian club in Los Angeles.”

The missive, sent by group founder and leader Lizzy George-Griffin, also included a rambling message that noted “THE HOLOCAUST WASN’T SPECIAL,” according to a copy of the ad obtained by the Post.

When reached by the Post Wednesday, George-Griffin doubled down on her ban on Israel backers.

Plus: “A fellow student, who wished to be identified only by her initials, said ‘antisemitism has become commonplace at Columbia,’ and said it was ‘bewildering’ that someone as ‘disturbingly ignorant’ as George-Griffin was admitted to the top tier university.”

The Ivy League admissions offices have admitted exactly the kind of students they wanted.