LET’S HOPE: We’re Seeing the Death of ‘Woke,’ Discriminatory ESG Corporate Policies.

ANALYSIS: TRUE. “Many law schools operate in a manner that reinforces ideological orthodoxy and chills dissenting views.”

IT’S COME TO THIS: Last June, we learned of a study that found that 25% of Gen Z job applicants brought a parent along with them to a job interview. This week, we learn that the Democratic Party nominee for President of the United States is bringing “America’s Dad” to her first interview.

Related:

Strong, Capable Woman Asks Man To Come With Her To Job Interview In Case They Ask Any Hard Questions https://t.co/17fwDAbmdZ pic.twitter.com/ldKX8dDFWh

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) August 28, 2024

Related:

Any interviewer who doesn't hold Kamala's feet to the fire over this has abandoned journalism. https://t.co/tVJUhQjnKA

— Abigail Shrier (@AbigailShrier) August 28, 2024

ROGER SIMON: Jack Smith Makes Me Think Trump Won in 2020. “I still remain somewhat agnostic, but the tenacity, resembling monomania, with which our Torquemada-like special prosecutor Jack Smith seeks to indict and convict Donald Trump leads me to believe Mr. Trump actually won. . . . So when I say Smith’s ongoing lawfare jihad against Trump makes me believe 45 actually won in 2020 more than I ever did, it is another way of saying something that should be apparent to those in and outside the legal world. Something fishy is going on here that goes beyond what is already obvious to many of us—the flagrant attempt to interfere with the 2024 election.”

FORKED TONGUE: From ‘Israel Has a Right To Defend Itself’ to ‘Immediate Ceasefire’: Rep. Susan Wild Caught Sending Contradictory Letters to Constituents, Stating Dueling Views on War.

MAYBE WE DON’T ACTUALLY NEED A PRESIDENT. OR A GOVERNMENT. Joe Biden Appears to be Done Pretending to be President.

MEDICINE: How Do Dubious Norms Get Established?

TIME FOR SOME SUNSHINE: Where Are the Facebook Files on Censorship?

HIGHER EDUCATION UPDATE: Professor at Toulouse School of Economics Writes Open Letter Accusing Harvard Professor of Plagiarism.

#JOURNALISM:

He didn’t have a role in it https://t.co/OSzYcvYlSN

— Kurt Schlichter (@KurtSchlichter) August 28, 2024

OPEN THREAD: Just do it.

THE NEW SPACE RACE: With successful airlock test, Lockheed Martin invests in inflatable space structures.

DECISIONMAKING: How 2 fatal shuttle disasters weighed on NASA’s decision to bring Boeing Starliner astronauts home on SpaceX Dragon.

A BLACK EYE FOR JUDGE RAKOFF: Sarah Palin Wins New Trial in Defamation Case Against New York Times: Appeals panel says trial judge made errors that deprived Palin of a fair trial.

A federal appeals court on Wednesday revived Sarah Palin’s defamation suit against the New York Times, ruling a trial judge committed a series of errors in presiding over the former Republican vice-presidential candidate’s case.

Palin’s lawsuit, filed in 2017, alleged the newspaper defamed her in an editorial about gun violence. The article incorrectly suggested that an ad circulated by Palin’s political-action committee inspired a 2011 shooting in Tucson, Ariz., where six people died, and then-Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was wounded. The Times issued two corrections and its editorial board tweeted an apology to its readers.

Palin, who sued the Times and former editorial page editor James Bennet, said those corrective efforts were insufficient.

Palin’s case went to trial in 2022 and a jury sided with the Times. In an unusual move, U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff announced during jury deliberations that he planned to dismiss the case after the verdict, concluding that Palin hadn’t met the demanding legal standard of proof.

The Second U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday said Rakoff’s move was improper and ordered a new trial.

The dismissal “improperly intruded on the province of the jury by making credibility determinations, weighing evidence, and ignoring facts or inferences that a reasonable juror could plausibly have found to support Palin’s case,” Judge John M. Walker wrote for a three-judge panel in a 56-page opinion.

The panel said Rakoff also made other missteps, including the erroneous exclusion of certain evidence, that impugned the reliability of the verdict.

Shane Vogt, a lawyer for Palin, called the ruling “a significant step forward in the process of holding publishers accountable for content that misleads readers and the public in general.”

A New York Times spokesman said the decision was disappointing. “We’re confident we will prevail in a retrial,” he said.

In granting the dismissal, Rakoff concluded that Palin hadn’t presented sufficient evidence that the Times acted with actual malice, meaning that it knew the editorial was false or acted with a reckless disregard for the truth. Public figures such as Palin are required to meet that standard to prevail in defamation cases.

Rakoff announced his ruling outside the presence of the jurors, while they were deliberating. The next day, jurors came to the same conclusion: Palin hadn’t proven her case. Later that evening, some jurors revealed they had seen notifications on their phones about Rakoff’s decision to toss the case. They said the alerts hadn’t affected their views.

But the Second Circuit said Wednesday that it had its doubts.

As it should have. The full opinion is here.

I’D BE SAD IF I WERE A FISH: Antidepressants Are Seeping Into Fish Everywhere – And It’s Changing Them.

Then there are the birth-control hormones in the water.

NOBODY TELL NANCY PELOSI: Oldest Wine in History Discovered in Ancient Roman Tomb.

ERIC COWPERTHWAITE: Re-Holstering Is Difficult: What We Can learn From The Secret Service During The Trump Attack. “Seriously, the holster, gun belt, magazine carriers are just as important as the gun and the training. If you spent $1000 on an Sig P320 X with red dot optics, but only spent $20 on the holster, you are in trouble.”

One would expect, though, that “trained law enforcement officers” would have mastered this very basic, though important, firearms skill well enough that they could perform it under stress. And another video of Trump arriving at the hospital appears to show the same agent having the same problem again.

COLOR ME SKEPTICAL: 2024 Cadillac Celestiq First Ride: Worth Rolls or Bentley Money? Nope: “But whereas Bentley offers an option to rotate the infotainment screen away in favor of a wood panel or analog clock, Cadillac presents a brilliant QLED screen spanning the abundant width of the car just under the windshield.”

BASED ON PAST PERFORMANCE, THAT’S ENOUGH FOR LIKE WHAT, TWO CHARGERS? Biden Administration to Issue More Than Half a Billion Dollars for EV Charging Infrastructure.

GOOD LUCK: Fake online reviews and testimonials are a headache for small businesses. They hope the FTC can help.

21ST CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: That feeling when your “cool-ass girl” can’t dig your online monkey torture vids.

HMM: Participating in Black Lives Matter Protest Isn’t Protected by Federal Labor Law.

CHANGE: Lilly cuts price on weight-loss drug Zepbound, selling it in single-dose vials.

THIS IS KIND OF A TELL, ISN’T IT? Democrats Are Freaking Out Over Republicans’ Efforts to Stop Illegal Aliens From Voting.

“OUR DEMOCRACY:”

In the past 24 hours:

-Dems force RFK Jr. to stay on the ballot
-Dems remove Cornel West off the ballot
-DOJ files an upgraded Trump indictment
-Facebook admits they censored posts in compliance with Biden-Harris requests.

Saving democracy by ending it.

— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) August 27, 2024