OUR FRIENDS IN ANKARA: Baghdad warns of ‘regional war’ over Turkish military presence.

The tensions between Iraq and Turkey have risen to the surface ahead of a long-expected offensive by Iraqi and U.S.-backed forces to retake the northern city of Mosul from Islamic State.

Turkey has warned the attack would send a wave of refugees over its border and, potentially, on to Europe.

Ankara also worries Baghdad’s Shi’ite Muslim-led forces will destabilize the largely Sunni city close to its territory.

It is uncomfortable with the arrangement of Kurdish forces expected to take part in the Mosul offensive, with the blessing of Baghdad and Washington.

Turkey announced late on Tuesday it was calling in Iraq’s ambassador to complain about the parliamentary vote, and the foreign ministry issued a statement expressing disappointment.

It will be years before we’re done paying the price for treating ISIS like the “jayvee.”

IF YOU INSIST: Stop Pining for Joe Biden.

CHANGE: U.S. Warships Dock in Vietnam.

Submarine tender USS Frank Cable and guided-missile destroyer USS John S. McCain arrived at the deep-water naval base in Khanh Hoa province on Sunday, in a sign of warming military ties between the two countries.

Cam Ranh Bay was used by the French, U.S. and Russian navies in years past. Vietnam has recently made the base available to visiting foreign navy vessels in an attempt to maintain a strong international presence in the South China Sea amid maritime disputes with China. Apart from the U.S. warships, vessels from Japan, Russia and France have recently docked there.

Before stopping at Cam Ranh Bay, the John S. McCain made a port call in nearby Da Nang City, the U.S. Navy said.

It’s an incredible thing that a ship named John S. McCain is making port calls in Vietnam.

NOTHING TO SEE HERE: FBI agreed to destroy laptops of Clinton aides with immunity deal, lawmaker says.

Immunity deals for two top Hillary Clinton aides included a side arrangement obliging the FBI to destroy their laptops after reviewing the devices, House Judiciary Committee sources told Fox News on Monday.

Sources said the arrangement with former Clinton chief of staff Cheryl Mills and ex-campaign staffer Heather Samuelson also limited the search to no later than Jan. 31, 2015. This meant investigators could not review documents for the period after the email server became public — in turn preventing the bureau from discovering if there was any evidence of obstruction of justice, sources said.

More effective than even BitBleach.

FASTER, PLEASE: ISIS’ Al-Bayan Radio Station in Mosul is Bombed Into Silence by Iraqi Jets.

The Al-Bayan radio station was “one of the strongest” propaganda tools for the militants inside Mosul, a spokesman at Iraq’s Joint Operation Command told NBC News.

Broadcasting stopped Sunday after the station was bombed by Iraqi jets, the spokesman said.

Backed by U.S. forces, the country’s military is poised for an attempt to retake the city of 1.2 million, which was overrun by ISIS fighters in June 2014.

Godspeed.

SHOT: The US has said it is suspending talks with Russia over Syria, accusing Moscow of having “failed to live up” to its commitments under a ceasefire deal.

CHASER: White House Warns of ‘Actions’ If Russia Won’t Negotiate.

Who’s in charge of our foreign policy, anyway?

NO SCARINESS PLEASE, IT’S HALLOWEEN: New Haven Public Schools Call For Ban On Clown Costumes.

Halloween is approaching and a school district in Connecticut has called for a ban on clown costumes and any “symbols of terror” as the “creepy clown” phenomena has put Americans in multiple states on edge, the Associated Press (AP) reported Tuesday.

Authorities at New Haven Public Schools said Monday that principals and building leaders were urged to ban clown costumes until more information on clown-related incidents is available, according to the AP.

“Clown-related incidents” has entered the American lexicon — this is not the 21st Century I was promised.

SHARKS GOTTA SWIM, BATS GOTTA FLY, BUBBLES GOTTA POP: Manhattan Apartment Sales Plunge Almost 20 Percent.

After the financial crisis, developers rushed to build luxury apartment towers with outsize apartments priced at $10 million or more. Now that they’re coming online, many are sitting unsold.

The overseas rich are no longer buying like they were a year ago, as China’s economy slows, oil prices hurt Russia and the Middle East, and Latin America suffers recessions. Meanwhile, American buyers are nervous about the November elections and the unsteady stock market.

There is an excess supply of apartments priced at more than $5 million “and more supply continues to come onto the market,” Miller said.

The supply of new development is rising three times as fast as existing apartment inventory, he said. Listing inventory of new development jumped 27 percent compared with last year, and the absorption rate increased 36 percent to an eight-month supply.

Miller Samuel CEO Jonathan Miller says the market is settling down to “something more sustainable,” but those numbers in the last graf tell a different story.

THEY WERE ALL IN ON IT: Turkey Suspends 12,800 Police Officers Following Failed Coup.

It wasn’t a failed coup; it’s a successful purge.

LEONARDO DICAPRIO: Climate change deniers shouldn’t hold public office.

“The scientific consensus is in and the argument is now over,” DiCaprio said at the White House’s South By South Lawn event.

“If you do not believe in climate change, you do not believe in facts, or in science or empirical truths and therefore, in my humble opinion, should not be allowed to hold public office.”

DiCaprio screened his film “Before the Flood,” a documentary about climate change. Ahead of the screening, he spoke on a panel with President Obama.

Shut up, he explained.

I’m curious to know how much denial it takes to fill up the gas tank of a private jet.

TO ASK THE QUESTION IS TO ANSWER IT: Has 2016 turned into most trivial US election ever?

QUESTION ASKED: Would Russia Attack & Invade the Baltics?

After conducting an exhaustive series of wargames wherein “red” (Russian) and “blue” (NATO) forces engaged in a wide range of war scenarios over the Baltic states, a Rand Corporation study called “Reinforcing Deterrence on NATO’s Eastern Flank” determined that a successful NATO defense of the region would require a much larger air-ground force than what is currently deployed.

In particular, the study calls for a NATO strategy similar to the Cold War era’s “AirLand Battle” doctrine from the 1980s. During this time, the U.S. Army stationed at least several hundred thousand troops in Europe as a strategy to deter a potential Russian invasion. Officials with U.S. Army Europe tell Scout Warrior that there are currenty 30,000 U.S. Army soldiers in Europe.

The Rand study maintains that, without a deterrent the size of at least seven brigades, fires and air support protecting Eastern Europe, that Russia cold overrun the Baltic states as quickly as in 60 hours.

It’s impossible to say if Russia would do such a thing, but 60 hours to destroy NATO must be awfully tempting.

MEGAN MCARDLE: Trump’s 1995 Return Shows Good Tax Policy at Work.

Why did people see scandalous tax avoidance in this case? At issue is the “net operating loss,” an accounting term that means basically what it sounds like: When you net out your expenses against the money you took in, it turns out that you lost a bunch of money. However, in tax law, this has a special meaning, because these NOLs can be offset against money earned in other years. You can use a “carryforward” to offset the losses against income made in future years (as many as 15 future years, under the federal tax law of 1995). You can also use a “carryback” to offset those losses against income you made in past years (three in 1995, which when added to the 15-year carryforward term, gives us the 18 years the Times refers to).

To judge from the reaction on Twitter, this struck many people as a nefarious bit of chicanery. And to be fair, they were probably helped along in this belief by the New York Times description of it, which made it sound like some arcane loophole wedged into our tax code at the behest of the United Association of Rich People and Their Lobbyists. They called it “a tax provision that is particularly prized by America’s dynastic families, which, like the Trumps, hold their wealth inside byzantine networks of partnerships, limited liability companies and S corporations.”

Every tax or financial professional I have heard from about the New York Times piece found this characterization rather bizarre.

Read the whole thing.

I SUPPOSE THIS WAS INEVITABLE: Colorado brewery trying to bring ‘cannabis-infused beer’ to all 50 states.

I’M EXPECTING AN EARTH-SHATTERING KABOOM: Blue Origin is likely to blow up its rocket Wednesday.

Blue Origin has launched and landed its New Shepard booster four times, but the reusable rocket party may come to an end Wednesday morning (Note: Poor weather in West Texas forced the company to delay the test for one day). That’s because the company plans an in-flight test of its launch abort system and will intentionally trigger it about 45 seconds after launch at an altitude of 16,000 feet. Such systems are designed to fire quickly and separate the crew capsule from the booster during an emergency.

“The high-acceleration portion of the escape lasts less than two seconds, but by then the capsule will be hundreds of feet away and diverging quickly,” Bezos wrote last month. “It will traverse twice through transonic velocities—the most difficult control region—during the acceleration burn and subsequent deceleration. The capsule will then coast, stabilized by reaction control thrusters, until it starts descending.”

But the booster will likely not be so lucky. The propulsion module, powered by a single BE-3 engine, was not designed to survive an in-flight escape, as it will be slammed with 70,000 pounds of off-axis force and hot exhaust. At Max-Q, it is not clear whether the propulsion module will break apart. If it somehow survives, the booster will likely be placed in a museum. If not, it’s expected to produce some fireworks upon impact with the Texas desert floor.

That promises to be quite a show.

LASERS — IS THERE ANYTHING THEY CAN’T DO? Lasers plus ‘mini’ craniotomy can remove larger brain tumors.

SURPRISE! Turkey Extending State of Emergency Another 3 Months.

The Turkish government says the state of emergency that went into effect following the failed coup on July 15 will be extended another three months, beginning October 19. Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus spoke to reporters Monday following a Cabinet meeting.

The main opposition CHP has condemned the move.

It wasn’t a failed coup; it’s a successful purge — CHP needs to watch its back.

MERGER: Bass Pro Shops acquiring Cabela’s for $5.5B.

I hope they don’t change much about Cabela’s, which has become my home away from home.

BAD LUCK: Obama Says Obamacare Has ‘Real Problems’ Congress Refuses to Fix.

If only the GOP Congress had gotten ObamaCare right the first time around.

MOLON LABE: NPR Reporter Has No Idea What ‘Come And Take It’ Means.

Sunday marked the 181st anniversary of the Battle of Gonzales, the first military engagement of the Texas Revolution, when Texian militiamen, responding to Mexican soldiers demanding the surrender of a small brass cannon, coined the now-famous battle cry, “Come and Take It!”

An NPR reporter decided to mark this anniversary with a story about how the phrase has been stolen by Second Amendment activists, “with no appreciation of its origins.” Some local residents of modern-day Gonzales, we’re told, “think it’s been cheapened—and they want it back.”

But neither the hapless NPR reporter nor the several anti-gun residents of Gonzales interviewed for the story know the actual origin of the phrase, or why its application to the ongoing national debate about gun control and the Second Amendment is entirely appropriate—and historically accurate.

They are blissfully unaware that “Come and take it” is a quote from King Leonidas I of Thermopylae.

“Blissfully unaware” is too kind. There’s scant evidence that there’s anyone in the field of journalism with a deep understanding of guns or gun rights, or with any willingness to learn.

REGULATORY CAPTURE: Half of ex-insurance commissioners went to work for industry.

That’s according to a Center for Public Integrity investigation, which tracked career moves between 2006 and 2016. Of 109 commissioners who left their posts, 55 of them ended up working for the insurance industry.

The investigation also details some of the cozy relationships between the regulators and the companies they worked to regulate — from sharing fancy dinners and drinks to commissioners receiving industry campaign contributions.

“A lot of commissioners don’t want to alienate the industry,” says Sally McCarty, an ex-Indiana commissioner. “Many people consider the job an audition for a better-paying job.”

Here’s yet another area where Glenn’s revolving door surtax would do us some good.

RESET: Russia’s Putin suspends plutonium cleanup accord with U.S. because of ‘unfriendly’ acts.

A Kremlin spokesman said Putin had signed a decree suspending the 2010 agreement under which each side committed to destroy tonnes of weapons-grade material because Washington had not been implementing it and because of current tensions in relations.

The two former Cold War adversaries are at loggerheads over a raft of issues including Ukraine, where Russia annexed Crimea in 2014 and supports pro-Moscow separatists, and the conflict in Syria.

The deal, signed in 2000 but which did not come into force until 2010, was being suspended due to “the emergence of a threat to strategic stability and as a result of unfriendly actions by the United States of America towards the Russian Federation”, the preamble to the decree said.

It also said that Washington had failed “to ensure the implementation of its obligations to utilize surplus weapons-grade plutonium”.

The 2010 agreement, signed by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and then-U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, called on each side to dispose of 34 tonnes of plutonium by burning in nuclear reactors.

Clinton doesn’t have much good to show for her four years as SecState.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE TO THIS MORNING’S OBAMACARE ITEM:

pic.twitter.com/lxU0pn9C1M

— neontaster (@neontaster) October 3, 2016

Was that marker a red line, by any chance?

NEW YORK TIMES: Ailing Obama Health Care Act May Have to Change to Survive.

“May?”

And what are they pitching to save ObamaCare from its inherent contradictions?

“More government, not less,” in the form of single payer, naturally.

BUT OF COURSE: Obama Admin Strikes ‘Jerusalem’ From Israel.

The Obama administration stripped Jerusalem from being located in Israel in its official communication of the president’s remarks in the ancient city at a memorial service for recently deceased former Israeli president Shimon Peres.

The White House, in a press release, originally sent out a press release attributing Obama’s remarks as taking place in “Jerusalem, Israel.”

Shortly after that statement was sent, the White House reissued the statement with “Israel” crossed out as the location.

Is it January 20, 2017 yet?