WASHINGTON FREE BEACON REPORTS: Fake Professor Calls Free Beacon ‘Fake News’

Fake professor, feminist, and activist Melissa “Mish” Zimdars has deemed the Washington Free Beacon “fake news” on a list that is now being distributed as a media guide by Harvard University.

Zimdars, a Donald Trump critic and Carly Rae Jepsen fan, is an assistant professor at Merrimack College in Massachusetts, whose research focus includes “social justice.” She has organized liberal protest rallies against student debt and refers to conservatives as the “DARK SIDE.”

She created her fake news list, “False, Misleading, Clickbait-y, and Satirical ‘News’ Sources,” shortly after Hillary Clinton’s defeat in the presidential election. The list, which Zimdars has already edited because news sites mistakenly appeared on it, features numerous conservative outlets.

Don’t underestimate these fake professors, no matter how ignorant, obtuse, or just plain wrong they might seem — one was recently a two-term President of the United States.

WAIT… WHAT? Texas state rep. proposes fines for masturbation.

As Father Guido Sarducci reminded us years ago, masturbation is a cheap sin but it can really add up.

DO YOU WANT MORE TRUMP? BECAUSE THIS IS HOW YOU GET MORE TRUMP:

“Oh shut up” is now my preferred response to “Everything is racist.”

GET OUTTA MY DREAMS, GET OFF OF MY CAR: Senator Praises Obama Fuel Economy Standards for Forcing Automakers to Innovate.

ROBERT TRACINSKI: Scott Pruitt Is Absolutely Right About Carbon Dioxide.

There is good reason for skepticism. For one thing, just on the “basic science,” Pruitt is absolutely correct. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, but it is not the most powerful greenhouse gas, by a long shot. Water vapor is far more effective at trapping heat and releasing it back to the atmosphere, primarily because it absorbs a lot more radiation in the infrared spectrum, which is released as heat.

That’s why all of the climate theories that project runaway global warming use water vapor to juice up the relatively small impact of carbon dioxide itself. They posit a “feedback loop” in which carbon dioxide increases temperatures, which increases the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere, which increases temperatures even more. These models need a more powerful greenhouse gas to magnify the effect of carbon dioxide.

But does it really work that way? By how much does water vapor magnify the impact of carbon dioxide? And is that effect dampened by other factors? Consider cloud formation: more water in the atmosphere means more clouds, which reflect sunlight back into space and have a cooling effect that counteracts the warming effect. But by how much?

The answer is that nobody really knows.

Read the whole thing.

I’d just add that the EPA was fine at its original mission of cleaning up America’s air, water, and our unparalleled scenery. But then its mission became saving the world, and for a free people, there’s nothing more dangerous than a government agency hellbent on saving the world.

HAVE YOU HUGGED A FRACKER TODAY? Oil touches three-month lows, as U.S. supply swells.

The price has fallen by more than 8 percent since last Monday, its biggest week-on-week drop in four months, and analysts said the slide may not have much further to run.

“The market is bearish because sentiment has turned. The risk is still towards the downside, but we are nowhere near the precipice,” PVM Oil Associates Tamas Varga said.

Goldman Sachs said in a note it remained “very confident” about commodity prices and maintained its price forecast of $57.50 a barrel for WTI in the second quarter.

U.S. drillers added oil rigs for an eighth consecutive week, Baker Hughes said on Friday, lifting spending to benefit from an earlier recovery in crude prices since the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) agreed to cut output. [RIG/U]

OPEC and other major oil producers including Russia reached an agreement late last year to rein in production by almost 1.8 million barrels per day (bpd) in the first half of 2017.

Although OPEC states have been complying with supply curbs, led by Saudi Arabia, it has not been enough to overshadow a rise in U.S. inventories to a new high.

I had been assured by no less than the (former) President of the United States that we “can’t just drill our way out to lower gas prices.”

What a noob.

But if we really want lower gas prices, let’s open another oil refinery or two and do something about the country’s crazy patchwork quilt of gasoline blends.

SALENA ZITO: Love and hate in Ohio.

“People immediately think, because you live in a town that is flat on its back, that you want to leave and, if you don’t, your lack of mobility is a sign of ignorance or ambition,” Hays says as she tidies up Froehlich’s Casual Corner, the restaurant she manages, after the lunch crowd clears out.

“Maybe people stay because they love where they live. Sometimes they leave, but most find their way back – they almost always come back. I did.”

Hays is one of those white working-class Rust Belt voters who did not vote for Trump. The 39-year-old mother of a six-year-old boy looks more like a twenty-something with her long blond hair pulled in a loose ponytail and her fresh-faced expression.

People just check off a box and typecast folks when they find out where they are from or what they do, she thinks: “It is one of the things that really bothers me about the perception people outside of towns like this have about towns like this. Honestly, stereotypes are a lazy analysis.”

Pop culture has become as harsh as national politics in its treatment of folks from the country’s interior, she says.

“Our politics has to become more personal, more decent, more connected to the people. So does our media and entertainment,” Hays says. “You don’t have to be a fan of the president to feel just as looked-down-upon for your values.”

I’d wager that Hays — and many, many more like her — will become a Trump supporter in time for the next election.

And the self-styled elite in Washington, New York, and Hollywood will have no one to blame but themselves.

TERMINATED: Arnold Schwarzenegger rules out running for senate.

Good. This is the time for the California GOP putting up young talent — fresh names, fresh faces — as the bills come due for 20-plus years of uncontested progressivism.

PRIVACY: This Secret Obamacare ‘Replacement’ Lets Your Boss Invade Your Privacy AND Gut Your Paycheck.

My friend, co-Coloradan, and Instapundit co-blogger Sarah Hoyt has gotten her Dyce Dare books back in virtual print — and they’re fun ones.

QUESTION ASKED: Can Merkel Bring Trump to Reason?

Let’s hope not.

KREMLIN STOOGE: Cooperation with Russia in Syria Off the Table for Trump Team.

Military officials, including Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, who orchestrated the 30-day interdepartmental review of the Islamic State group plan, have expressed deep skepticism about Russia’s ability to stand by previous commitments it’s made to the U.S. or reveal its true intentions in Syria. American officials estimate 80 percent of Russia’s air strikes have actually targeted positions of rebels fighting the Assad regime, not the Islamic State group.

Beyond the prospective symbolism of a new alliance, American war planners don’t see how bettering relations with Russia could achieve anything the U.S. can’t already do – a perspective some experts consider unwise.

“Our professional military and the people who are engaged in planning don’t actually think – other than preventing inadvertent fire, friendly fire, collateral damage – they’re very skeptical of this theory of the Russians actually being much use to our efforts,” an adviser to the Trump team told U.S. News, one of many who are familiar with the Islamic State group plan and spoke on the condition of anonymity because they are not allowed to publicly discuss it.

Again, you might experience some difficulty in reconciling stories like this one with all the talk about Trump getting elected with the Kremlin’s help in order to do Putin’s bidding.

SECURITY: CIA Leak Reveals Gaps in Patchwork of Android Software.

The CIA appears to have been exploiting vulnerabilities in Android smartphones and other devices for years, according to the WikiLeaks documents, though it is unclear which versions of Android could be affected. Google said late Wednesday that after a review of the WikiLeaks documents, it was confident Android security updates “shield users from many of the alleged vulnerabilities.”

But Google data shows only 2.8% of Android devices run the latest software, released in August, which has the most up-to-date patches. Millions of Android phones run years-old software, sometimes with widely known security gaps. Indeed, nearly two-thirds of Android devices use software released in early 2015 or earlier. The WikiLeaks documents were taken from the CIA from 2013 to 2016.

This disconnect between Google (which produces security updates promptly) and carriers (who don’t always make those updates available for a variety of reason) has been known for a long time. The CIA hacking story just highlights it.

If Android is your preferred mobile operating system and if security is important to you, consider going with a “pure Android” brand like Nexus or one of the Google Play Edition phones from other manufacturers. Those models do receive timely new versions, updates, and patches.

CHARLIE MARTIN: Radiation Reporters Go Bananas.

Charlie has become my go-to guy for anything involving radiation panic — he knows his facts and figures better than just about anybody reporting on this stuff for the mainstream media.

AND I FEEL FINE: The End of the World…for Liberals.

Jeffrey Folks:

A powerful mental construct – the liberal myth of a progressive utopia brought about by surrender of the individual to state control – is at risk of being swept away by a great movement to free consciousness from the controlling ideas of the liberal past. As Shelby Steele wrote in a remarkable March 6 op-ed (“The Exhaustion of American Liberalism”), we stand “at the end of something,” that something being the radical mindset that has dominated so much of American intellectual life since the 1960s.

“The jig is up.” Liberalism no longer possesses the moral authority to control our national politics.

Liberals are terrified of Trump because they know that their great myth, once the light of consciousness has been shined on it, will dissolve as quickly as a grain of salt in water. As Steele puts it, the “president rolls his eyes when he is called a racist, and we all – liberal and conservative alike – know that he isn’t one.” Elizabeth Warren’s Jeff Sessions rant was just that: a hysterical rant, and everyone knows it. “White guilt,” and all that goes with it, is now just tiresome noise. There is no reality to liberals’ mental myth of the enlightened state. Once it comes under awareness, it dissolves.

Dissolution happened remarkably quickly to the Soviet Union’s “enlightened state,” and America’s Progressive Left doesn’t enjoy nearly as much political and cultural power as the Politburo did.

They do, however, have a greater sense of entitlement. I’m afraid Folks may overestimate how quietly that may go.

BREXIT: Sturgeon To Give May An “Ultimatum” As UK Preapres For Critical Vote Ahead Of Article 50.

On Monday the Brexit bill returns to the House of Commons, the U.K.’s lower house, for debate after the House of Lords said it wanted guarantees that EU citizens living in the U.K. could stay after Brexit and that Parliament could vote on the final terms. The final bill must be approved by both houses. Should the bill pass Monday, the government could invoke Article 50 as early as Tuesday according to weekend press reports, but negotiations in Parliament could last several days. The Brexit spokesman for the main opposition Labour Party, Keir Starmer, told Sky News he expects the government to trigger it on Wednesday or Thursday.

Even if the House of Commons votes in favor of the amendments, May is expected to keep her timetable of triggering by the end of the month. But it would underline how small her majority is in the lower house. Complicating matters is a tweet moments ago by BBG political editor Laura Kuenssberg, who reported that Scotland’s Nicola Sturgeon will give May an ultimatum: give Scotland a different Brexit deal or she’ll call for section 30, the indyref process.

“Indyref” is short for “independence referendum.” In other words, a repeat of the failed 2014 vote on Scottish independence. And with European Union membership on the line, the Scots might just disunite the Kingdom, given a second chance.

And that would be that for Labour ever hoping to win a majority in the British Parliament any time soon.

UPDATE: It’s official — “Scotland’s leader seeks new independence referendum.”

ANDREW MALCOLM: Trump is doing what Obama didn’t do.

Trump has been meeting all along with congressional leaders. Now, he’s had, of all people, Sen. Lindsay Graham of South Carolina over for lunch. Then, Mr. and Mrs. Marco Rubio and Mr. and Mrs. Ted Cruz came for separate social dinners. Social is what Washington calls meal-time lobbying, and what no one expected last year during the primary campaign when Trump mocked those men.

The other evening the Trump White House had key committee members in for drinks and social bowling. The president will be working that Oval Office phone to Capitol Hill, as he has to many foreign leaders since Jan. 20.

Trump prefers that personal touch, as he did in his real-estate dealing days, the opposite of aloof. Both he and Mike Pence are holding a series of “listening sessions” with leaders from education, small business, big business, community banks and so forth.

Somehow, recent encouraging economic news and the administration’s legislative agenda always come up, starting with Obamacare’s repeal and replacement, then tax reform. And most sessions end with POTUS inviting attendees into the Oval Office for a once-rare, much-coveted photo in that fabled place.

Such focused attention by a president tends to increase support and mute disagreement, while fueling positive word of mouth about him and his plans, almost like an investment in a long-term real estate deal.

Anybody who’s been in business for almost any length of time understands that they don’t know everything — or they don’t stay in business.

That aside, you might be having some difficulty reconciling this report of Trump reaching out and listening to the people’s elected representatives — and even to elected foreign leaders — with all that talk about Trump being a Putin-loving autocrat.

BREAKING: Gunfire Erupts in Ferguson after New Michael Brown Footage Broadcast.

FASTER, PLEASE: Defunding NPR Likely Wouldn’t Go Into Effect for 2 Years.

The funding for CPB, which receives roughly $450 million a year for public television and public radio, is allotted two years in advance. Any appropriations bill that did not include new funding for the CPB would mean that it would not be defunded until fiscal year 2019.

President Donald Trump is expected to release his budget blueprint on Monday. Transition officials have signaled that the president plans dramatic cuts, including privatizing the CPB and eliminating both the National Endowment for the Arts and Humanities.

The move would cut funding to National Public Radio, widely considered liberal-leaning, which recently failed to disclose during an interview with Trump-bashing former CIA analyst Ned Price that he was a Hillary Clinton donor.

NPR claims federal funding is “essential,” even though it also acknowledges that on average “less than 1 percent” of its annual operating budget comes from grants from the CPB.

Then they shouldn’t have any problem making up the difference.

SNOWFALLS ARE NOW JUST A THING OF THE PAST: Parts of Mass. could get up to 2 feet of snow Tuesday.

Forecasters say it is possible that some pockets of Central Massachusetts could get up to two feet of snow. Tuesday’s storm is expected to dump a foot of snow on Boston, 12 to 18 inches is forecasted to fall in MetroWest and the Merrimack Valley, with the Cape and islands due for a smaller dose of between 4 and 6 inches, according to the National Weather Service.

The National Weather Service issued a blizzard watch for the eastern part of the state from Tuesday afternoon until late at night.

Wind gusts could reach 50 miles per hour inland and 65 miles per hour along the coast amid the heavy snow. So-called thundersnow and coastal flooding could also accompany the storm.

I’ve been caught out in one of those “thundersnow” storms, and they’re no laughing matter.

VIDEO: Putin’s Spox Dmitry Peskov: Our Ambassador Met W/Team Clinton Too.

It’s almost as though foreign ambassadors think it’s a part of their job to get to know potential U.S. presidents.

IT COULDN’T IT BE ANY WORSE THAN CELEBRITY APPRENTICE: 5 Reasons a Senate Run by Arnold Schwarzenegger Won’t End Well.

NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL WINNING! The Saudis Won’t Like This: Massive Oil Discovery Made in Alaska.

MATTHEW CONTINETTI: The ISIS Endgame.

ISIS doesn’t have a chance. American air and ground forces, working with local proxies, are about to terminate its existence as a state. “Crushed,” to paraphrase President Trump. A just—and popular—cause.

But that won’t be the end. Recent events suggest that the military defeat of ISIS is just the beginning of a renewed American involvement in Iraq and Syria. And whether the American public and president are prepared for or willing to accept the probable costs of such involvement is unknown. That is reason for concern.

To glimpse the future, look at the city of Manbij in northeast Syria. Humvees and Strykers flying the American flag have appeared there in recent days. The mission? Not to defeat ISIS. Our proxies kicked them out last year. What we are doing in Manbij is something altogether different from a military assault: a “deterrence and reassurance” operation meant to dissuade rival factions from massacring one another. If you can’t remember when President Obama or President Trump called for such an operation, that’s because they never did.

And there’s a twist. One of the factions we are trying to intimidate is none other than the army of Turkey, a NATO member and purported ally. Turkey moved in on Manbij not because of ISIS but because of the Kurds. Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish autocrat, opposes one of our Kurdish proxies. He says the YPG is the Syrian affiliate of the Kurdistan Worker’s Party, which has conducted an insurgency against his government for decades. Yet the YPG is also the most effective indigenous anti-ISIS force on the ground. We need it to take Raqqa.

Things get even more complicated.

In the Middle East, things always do.

HOW MANY HARD DRIVES CAN SPIN ON THE HEAD OF A PIN? Scientists Store Data on a Single Atom for the First Time.