CHANGE: IRS Guts Enforcement of Obamacare Individual Mandate.

It’s a tax!

BUSTED: 2 More Arrested in Killing of Kim Jong-un’s Half Brother, Malaysia Says.

The Indonesian, identified as Siti Aishah, 25, is the second woman arrested in the case. Her appearance matches the image of a woman captured in airport surveillance videos, said a statement from Khalid Abu Bakar, the inspector general of police. The police later said in a statement that Ms. Siti’s boyfriend, a 26-year-old Malaysian, had been arrested “to assist in investigations.” He was identified as Muhammad Farid Bin Jalaluddin.

In Jakarta, an official from Indonesia’s Foreign Ministry said that Ms. Siti was an Indonesian citizen. The Indonesian government has asked for access to her so that its embassy employees in Kuala Lumpur can provide legal assistance.

The arrests brought the number of people detained in the case to three. A woman arrested Wednesday was carrying a Vietnamese passport, but it remained unclear whether she was from Vietnam.

The news media in Malaysia reported that the police were looking for four male suspects, suggesting that the plot was more involved than initially indicated. It was unclear whether the Malaysian man arrested Thursday was one of the four.

Was Kim Jong-nam’s assassination so sloppily executed that it allowed half the perpetrators to be caught within days? Or was Kim’s assassination sloppily executed on purpose, in order to enhance Kim Jong-un’s reputation for being crazy-dangerous?

AN ‘AGGRESSIVE, PROACTIVE ATTACK’ TO PREVENT DISASTER AT THE OROVILLE DAM:

A swarm of trucks and helicopters dumped 1,200 tons of material per hour onto the eroded hillside that formed the dam’s emergency spillway. One quarry worked around the clock to mine boulders as heavy as 6 tons. An army of workers mixed concrete slurry to help seal the rocks in place.

“This is an aggressive, proactive attack to address the erosion,” said Bill Croyle, acting director of the state Department of Water Resources. “There’s a lot of people, a lot of equipment, a lot of materials moving around, from the ground and from the air.”

At the main spillway, a different and riskier operation was underway: Despite a large hole in the concrete chute, officials have been sending a massive amount of the swollen reservoir’s water down the chute to the Feather River in a desperate attempt to reduce the lake’s level.

The structure continued to hold Tuesday without sustaining more significant damage, officials said.

The idea is to get the reservoir’s water level low enough that it can take in rain from an upcoming series of storms without reaching capacity. If the reservoir filled up again, water would automatically flow down the emergency spillway, which on Sunday appeared to be nearing collapse, forcing the evacuation of more than 100,000 people downstream.

I don’t think “proactive” means what acting Department of Water Resources director Bill Croyle thinks it means. A proactive effort would have fixed the damaged spillway during the drought, when the water level was far below the danger zone.

WHO’S THE BOSS? Spies Keep Intelligence From Donald Trump on Leak Concerns.

The officials’ decision to keep information from Mr. Trump underscores the deep mistrust that has developed between the intelligence community and the president over his team’s contacts with the Russian government, as well as the enmity he has shown toward U.S. spy agencies. On Wednesday, Mr. Trump accused the agencies of leaking information to undermine him.

In some of these cases of withheld information, officials have decided not to show Mr. Trump the sources and methods that the intelligence agencies use to collect information, the current and former officials said. Those sources and methods could include, for instance, the means that an agency uses to spy on a foreign government.

A White House official said: “There is nothing that leads us to believe that this is an accurate account of what is actually happening.”

A spokesman for the Office of Director of National Intelligence said: “Any suggestion that the U.S. intelligence community is withholding information and not providing the best possible intelligence to the president and his national security team is not true.”

Stay tuned.

SHOOTING THE MESSENGER: Calif. Student Suspended for Taping Prof’s Anti-Trump ‘Act of Terrorism’ Rant.

LET THEM EAT SOY: California Schools Cut Meat, Cheese From Lunches To Fight Global Warming.

Stunt their growth, and as adults they’ll consumer fewer resources.

STUDY: Older Children Are Smarter Than Younger Siblings.

And only children are the smartest of all, or so we were led to think.

I WANT TO BELIEVE: Churchill essay on the possibility of alien life discovered in US college.

The 11-page article was probably intended for the now defunct Sunday newspaper the News of the World, but for reasons unknown the essay remained with his publisher and only recently resurfaced at the US National Churchill Museum at Westminster College in Missouri.

In the essay, Churchill ponders the conditions that make for a habitable world, and on considering the vast number of stars perhaps circled by alien planets, comes to the conclusion that the answer to the essay’s title question, Are We Alone in the Universe?, was surely a resounding “no”.

“The first time I saw it, I thought the combination of Churchill and such a big question had to be a fascinating read, and that proved to be right,” Timothy Riley, the museum’s director, told the Guardian. “It is completely fitting that Churchill would ask such a question. He was keenly interested in science and technological advancement and supported it throughout his long career.” Riley said the museum hopes to make the essay public as soon as it can.

Fascinating find. Fascinating man.

PATRICK POOLE: The Latest Rundown on the Mike Flynn Deep State Hit Job.

BRAVE NEW WORLDS: Astronomers discover 60 new planets including ‘super Earth’.

One planet in particular, Gliese 411b, has been generating plenty of attention. Described as a “hot super Earth with a rocky surface,” Gliese 411b is located in the fourth-nearest star system to the Sun, making it the third-nearest planetary system to the Sun, according to the U.K.’s University of Hertfordshire, which participated in the research. Gliese 411b (also known as GJ 411b or Lalande 21185) orbits the star Gliese 411 (or GJ 411).

Despite the “super Earth” label, Dr. Mikko Tuomi from University of Hertfordshire’s Centre for Astrophysics told Fox News that Gliese 411b is too hot for life to exist on its surface.

Gliese 411b doesn’t actually appear to be all that super.

TRUMP: ‘The Israelis are Going to Have to Show Some Flexibility’ on Peace Process.

YOU CAN’T SAY THAT ON TELEVISION: Former ESPN Commentator Sues After Being Terminated for Venus Williams ‘Gorilla’ Remark.

Guerrilla, gorilla, potayto, patahto.

KIM’S LONG ARM: Police Hunt Women Suspected of Poisoning Kim Jong Un’s Brother.

The women approached Kim Jong Nam in Kuala Lumpur’s international airport on Monday and later fled in a taxi, Lee Cheol-woo, chairman of the intelligence committee in South Korea’s parliament, told reporters on Wednesday after meeting the nation’s intelligence chief. South Korean officials believe he was poisoned with either a needle or a spray, Lee said.

Putinesque.

WHEW! Court OKs Federal Officials Taking Control Of Private Lands To Save Endangered Frogs That Don’t Live There.

It seems like only minutes ago I was reminding you we have more government than we need and less than we pay for.

INFRASTRUCTURE: Nearly 56,000 bridges called structurally deficient.

More than one in four bridges (173,919) are at least 50 years old and have never had major reconstruction work, according to the ARTBA analysis. State transportation officials have identified 13,000 bridges along interstates that need replacement, widening or major reconstruction, according to the group.

“America’s highway network is woefully underperforming,” said Alison Premo Black, the group’s chief economics who conducted the analysis. “It is outdated, overused, underfunded and in desperate need of modernization.”

We have far more government than we need, and a hell of a lot less than we pay for.

BUT OF COURSE: Wegmans faces boycott over Trump wines.

The Gates-based grocer is being called on to remove Trump Winery products from its Virginia stores, where it sells 237 different wines from 58 wineries in that state.

The Stop Trump Wine group has asked Virginians to boycott grocers, retailers, restaurants and other organizations doing business with Trump Winery.

“Events during Donald Trump’s campaign made it clear that Eric Trump, the president of Trump Winery in Charlottesville, Virginia, shares the views of his father,” according to the group’s website. “Let’s demonstrate through economic action that the residents and businesses of Charlottesville will not stand for the hatred espoused by Eric Trump and those like him.”

How’s that workin’ out for ya?

[Second link was broken, fixed now — sorry!]

FUNDAMENTALLY TRANSFORMED: The United States has slipped to its lowest level in world rankings of economic freedom.

In the latest report, the U.S. ranks 17th out of 180 countries with an economic freedom score of 75.1 out of 100. Last year, the U.S. ranked number 11.

Hong Kong, Singapore and New Zealand topped the list, with respective scores of 89.8, 88.6 and 83.7. Other countries that placed ahead of the U.S. included Canada, Taiwan and Britain, among others.

The Heritage report said countries with scores between 80-100 are considered economically “free,” while countries scores between 70-79.9 are considered “mostly free.”

“Land of the mostly free” is not how I was raised.

PLEASE, NO: Amazon, Google Dial Up Plans to Turn Smart Speakers Into Home Phones.

Amazon’s Echo or the Google Home could be used to make or receive calls, people familiar with the matter said, a functionality that would give them further control over consumers’ digital lives at home.

The tech giants could launch the feature this year, the people said—but the effort is hung up over concerns about privacy, telecom regulations and emergency services. And they are aware of the inherent awkwardness of having phone conversations on a speaker.

Amazon and Google are part of a broader race among tech giants to create and install digital assistants in everything from cars to homes. Adding phone capability is a way to tack on more functions, which could lead to greater adoption and more frequent use.

Such a feature would further disrupt traditional telecom firms like AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. The speakers could diminish the dwindling landline business and take attention away from smartphones.

I barely want my phone to act as a phone.

SORRY NOT SORRY: NY Times reporter apologizes for calling First Lady Melania Trump ‘a hooker’

“I want to take ownership of a mistake I made,” New York Times features writer Jacob Bernstein said on Twitter. “Speaking at a party in what I thought was a personal conversation, I nevertheless made a stupid remark about the first lady.”

He continued, “My editors have made it clear my behavior was not in keeping with the standards of the Times, and I agree. My mistake, referring to unfounded rumors, shouldn’t reflect on anyone else and I apologize profusely.”

Model Emily Ratajkowski revealed in a tweet Monday that an unidentified New York Times reporter called the first lady a “hooker.”

“Sat next to a journalist from the NYT last night who told me ‘Melania is a hooker,'” the model tweeted.

It’s difficult to take seriously an apology from a New York Times writer when it’s published on a Twitter account with barely over 10,000 followers.

But I guess the good news is that it’s no longer racist to call the First Lady a hooker.

IT’S DIFFERENT WHEN THEY DO IT:

Worse, failed-novelist-turned-Obama-Administration-fabulist Ben Rhodes bragged about lying to the press, insulted them to their faces as 27-year-old-know-nothings — and the press came back pleading for “More, sir, please?”

TOP CALIFORNIA DEM: ‘Half of My Family’ Could be Deported by Trump Order.

Lawmakers and their families don’t have to follow the laws, right?

MORE ON TRUMP-NETANHYAHU MEETING: Trump, Netanyahu to Reset US-Israeli Relations After Strained 8 Years.

Schanzer believes both the Iran deal and the settlements issue can be addressed without too much controversy.

“With the settlements, there was common ground reached by Bush and Ariel Sharon, which allowed Israelis to continue to build in areas that already have significant Israeli population,” Schanzer said, referring to former President George W. Bush and Sharon, a former Israeli prime minister.

Schanzer added it might be difficult to undo the entire Iran nuclear deal, which relieved sanctions on the country, and was agreed upon by the United States and five other countries. However, it’s likely Trump will enforce the agreement in a way Obama would not.

“It will be about rigorous enforcement of the deal and not allowing Iran to cheat even in minor ways,” Schanzer said. “The Obama administration wouldn’t enforce this out of fear the deal would unravel. Trump doesn’t care about Obama’s foreign policy legacy.”

Bingo.

BE CAREFUL OUT THERE: New Mac malware pinned on same Russian group blamed for election hacks.

Like its counterparts for other platforms, the Mac version of Xagent is a modular backdoor that can be customized to meet the objectives of a given intrusion, researchers from antivirus provider Bitdefender reported in a blog post published Tuesday. Capabilities include logging passwords, snapping pictures of screen displays, and stealing iOS backups stored on the compromised Mac.

The discovery builds on the already considerable number of tools attributed to APT28, which other researchers call Sofacy, Sednit, Fancy Bear, and Pawn Storm. According to researchers at CrowdStrike and other security firms, APT28 has been operating since at least 2007 and is closely tied to the Russian government. An analysis Bitdefender published last year determined APT28 members spoke Russian, worked mostly during Russian business hours, and pursued targets located in Ukraine, Spain, Russia, Romania, the US, and Canada.

And from the comments: “These malwares are mostly used for targeted attacks, I don’t think you’re likely to run into them in the wild.”

SHADOW ADMINISTRATION: Former Obama Officials, Loyalists Waged Secret Campaign to Oust Flynn.

The effort, said to include former Obama administration adviser Ben Rhodes—the architect of a separate White House effort to create what he described as a pro-Iran echo chamber—included a small task force of Obama loyalists who deluged media outlets with stories aimed at eroding Flynn’s credibility, multiple sources revealed.

The operation primarily focused on discrediting Flynn, an opponent of the Iran nuclear deal, in order to handicap the Trump administration’s efforts to disclose secret details of the nuclear deal with Iran that had been long hidden by the Obama administration.

Insiders familiar with the anti-Flynn campaign told the Free Beacon that these Obama loyalists plotted in the months before Trump’s inauguration to establish a set of roadblocks before Trump’s national security team, which includes several prominent opponents of diplomacy with Iran. The Free Beacon first reported on this effort in January.

This political conspiracy is a much bigger story than the ouster of a single person, but it won’t be reported that way.

BRET BAIER: Dems Smell Blood in the Water After Flynn Ouster.