THAT’S ENTERTAINMENT: Gold Harvey Weinstein Casting Couch Appears Near Oscars Venue.

“CELEBRATE DIVERSITY” MORPHED INTO “SILO’ED DIVERSITY” SLOWLY I HARDLY EVEN NOTICED: A group of students at the University of Texas, San Antonio plans to start publishing a “No Whites Allowed” (NWA) magazine. “White people are welcome to attend the launch party Thursday night, but while their support is ‘appreciated,’ the founders insist that ‘it’s a zine for QPOC and by QPOC [queer persons of color]’.”

BEGUN, THE TRADE WARS HAVE? Trump to Impose Steep Aluminum and Steel Tariffs.

The move fulfills a Trump campaign promise that helped fuel his surprise 2016 campaign victory in the industrial Midwest, and he told a White House meeting of industry executives that his coming measures—25% tariffs on steel imports, 10% on aluminum—would revive domestic manufacturing. “You’re going to see a lot of good things happen. You’re going to see expansion of the companies,” the president said.

But the impact on companies that use steel was swift and sharp. The Dow Jones Industrial Average tumbled more than 500 points, or 2%, after the announcement, as shares of big steel users, including auto makers Ford Motor Co. and General Motors Co., dropped even further.

A cascade of industry trade groups moved quickly to denounce the moves, including beer and boat makers worried about costlier aluminum, and manufacturers of chemicals, air conditioners, and oil pipelines all concerned about pricier steel inputs.

“It’s going to be expensive,” said Ed Bolas, chief financial officer at DyCast Specialties Corp., a Minnesota maker of parts for products including cutting tools and engines. “All of it will impact the consumer.”

Neither Smoot nor Hawley could be reached for comment.

JAMES ANTLE: Trump’s one-man ‘good cop, bad cop’ routine with the NRA.

The NRA supported Trump when vast swathes of the conservative movement were still skeptical, but his remarks about disarming high-risk gun owners first and practicing due process later may bust through those limits. “The NRA is also going to protect due process for innocent Americans, and that is an approach that we are going to hold to,” group spokeswoman and commentator Dana Loesch told Fox News, calling it “a foundational principle of this country.”

In the course of a meeting that flummoxed Republicans, Trump expressed support for banning bump stocks through executive action, universal background checks, as well as strengthening the existing system, raising the age for AR-15 purchases and even a vote on an amendment by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., banning assault weapons. He told House Minority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., that concealed-carry reciprocity, an important issue for gun rights activists, was politically untenable.

Trump has turned on early supporters before — just ask beleaguered Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

Of course, Second Amendment voters can do something Sessions can’t — make Trump a one-term President. Although it’s a safe bet Trump is well aware of that, and that his recent moves are more about positioning than tramping due process or supporting a new “assault weapons” ban.

WHY ARE LEFTWING PUBLICATIONS SUCH CESSPITS OF BOYS’-CLUB MISOGYNY?

D. C. MCALLISTER: When Liberals Didn’t Mind ‘Bringing Guns Into the Schools.’ “Yes, even Obama.”

YOUR DAILY TREACHER: ‘Crisis Actors’ Don’t Exist, and You’re Probably Just Helping That Nonsense Spread.

YOU KNOW THE ANSWER: Why Are Senate Dems Torpedoing Their Own Gun Bill? “Because it might pass — and this tells you everything you need to know about Washington DC.”

What a shame that George Washington’s name is still attached to the city our capital has become.

THE CHICAGO WAY: Sharyl Attkisson Accuses Obama DOJ of Secretly Swapping Out Her Computer Hard Drive.

DON’T MESS WITH TEXAS: Texas private school arming administrators with guns.

WORDS OF WONDER: Keith Richards on reuniting the Rolling Stones and going sober: ‘The drugs are so bland these days.’

Keith Richards hasn’t had a drink since Christmas. The legendarily hard-living rock and roll icon sounds almost reluctant to admit to sobriety. “I’m not saying I’m definitely off all of this stuff,” he protests. “In six months’ time, I might be on it again. But at the moment, for a couple of months, I haven’t touched it.” When I ask how he is finding abstinence, he chuckles ruefully. “It’s novel.”

The 74-year-old Rolling Stone still smokes incessantly and speaks as if his vocal cords are coated in thick layers of fur, but he insists that cigarettes and coffee are the only real vices he has left. He is impressively disdainful of the prescription drugs rife among a younger generation, such as Xanax and Percocet. “Drugs are not interesting these days. They are very institutionalised and bland. And, anyway, I’ve done ’em all.”

This is a nice… no, that’s not the word… solid… no, that’s not it either…

It’s everything you want out of an interview with Keith Richards. Highly recommended.

CIVIL RIGHTS UPDATE: Michigan Gov. Snyder Signs Legislation Expanding Access To Craft Beer.

MATT MARGOLIS: Five Reasons Trump’s Reelection Announcement Was Politically Smart.

MICHAEL LEDEEN: Indicted Russians. That’s It?

WELL, YES: Electric Vehicle Subsidies Hurt the Poor and Help the Rich.

I’LL TAKE MY CHANCES: Yes, bacon really is killing us.

ON TOP OF EVERYTHING ELSE, NOW THERE’S THIS TO WORRY ABOUT: KFC faces gravy shortage in United Kingdom after rebounding from chicken panic.

IRAN: Anti-Hijab Protesters Beaten, Tortured, Charged With ‘Inciting Prostitution.’

THIS SEEMS WISE: Sen. Cory Gardner says to take North Korea talks with “an entire salt block.”

BLUE STATE BLUES: California has worst ‘quality of life’ in US, study says.

It’s actually pretty great there — if you’re rich. For everyone else, it’s clogged (and broken) highways, unaffordable rents and mortgages, filthy streets, beggars, rural destitution, and endless nannystatism.

But if you understand progressivism as a system of high-tech feudalism, then California’s high-low split is exactly what California’s progressives have been aiming for.

SURPRISING PRECISELY NOBODY: YouTube Secretly Using SPLC To Police Videos.

DO YOU WANT LESS TRUMP? Because this is how Trump gets less Trump.

NOT UNDER SOCIALISM. NEXT QUESTION? Can Venezuela Be Saved?

This is a very, very long New York Times feature, with ponderous paragraphs like this one…

Historians have come up with all sorts of arguments about the arc of Venezuelan history and how things went so wrong. A couple of points strike me as indispensable to any case: Venezuela is the birthplace of Latin American independence and sits on the largest proven reserves of oil in the world. How you interpret the role of these factors in any given historic event is a matter of personal politics and granular debate, but you can’t have a serious discussion about Venezuela without taking both into account. For most of the past century, the country has whipsawed between political movements that court and reflect and sometimes renounce the legacy of anti-imperialism and the towering glut of riches.

…and yet can’t find the time for even one use of the word “socialism” or “socialist.”

But there is an answer to the headline’s question: “Get the hell out of my way!” as the wise man once said.

THE BEST DEFENSE… Putin unveils new Russian nuclear missile, says it renders defenses ‘useless.’

He boasted that Russia’s new ICBM is “powerful and modern and defense systems will not be able to withstand it,” he said. “Missile defences will be useless against it.”

Other new weapons include the Avangard — an intercontinental hypersonic missile that would fly to targets at a speed 20 times the speed of sound — and a weapons system called Kinzhal, already deployed in southern Russia, that uses hypersonic missiles that can strike targets 1,250 miles away.

That’s great. But Russia had better learn to ween its economy off of oil dependency, if Putin expects to buy more than a handful of his new systems. Procurement of Moscow’s new Su-57 stealth fighter and revolutionary T-14 Armata tank has already been cut and/or postponed due to sanctions and low oil prices.

NOAH ROTHMAN: Ben Rhodes and the Democratic Guilt Complex on Russia and Iran.

When you’re good at something, you should never do it for free. That’s perhaps why Barack Obama’s former deputy national security advisor, Ben Rhodes, is gearing up to politicize national security issues once again in a professional capacity.

On Tuesday, Rhodes revealed his intention to join former Obama administration officials, Hillary Clinton staffers, and a handful of career civil servants to form “National Security Action,” a 501(c)(4) that will not endorse candidates but will campaign against them. You can probably guess who this organization’s primary target will be. “We’re a temporary organization,” Rhodes told the Washington Post. “Our hope is to be out of business in three years.”

There’s more of that revolving door action, assuming Rhodes means what he says — which by his own admission is a dangerous assumption.

But Rhodes’ problem since leaving the Obama Administration is that his audience no longer consists exclusively of 27-year-olds who literally know nothing. As you can see for yourself at his sad (and widely mocked) Twitter feed.