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FEBRUARY 5,  2018

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:55 P.M. ET: 

IRAN MILITANT – FROM THE WASHINGTON FREE BEACON:  Iran announced on Monday that it has begun mass-producing a new weaponized drone that carries smart bombs capable of precision strikes, according to the Islamic Republic's military leaders.  Iran, which has engaged in a massive military buildup since receiving billions of dollars in cash windfalls as a result of the landmark nuclear deal, says that these advanced new drones will be delivered to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps, or IRGC, which has been coordinating war efforts across the Middle East, including most controversially in Syria, where Iranian-backed forces have attacked U.S. troops.  They should call their drone the Obama, in honor of the man who made it possible.   Another model could be called the Kerry.

HILLARY SPEAKS – FROM THE WASHINGTON FREE BEACON:  Two-time failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton said Monday that she intends to continue fighting for women's rights and to "remain on the front lines of democracy," despite her 2016 election loss to President Donald Trump.  "Advancing the rights, opportunities, and full participation of women and girls is the great unfinished business of the 21st century," Clinton told students at Georgetown University in Washington D.C. "I intend to keep fighting to pursue this agenda and remain on the front lines of democracy."  Clinton appeared at the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace, and Security to give a speech, participate in a panel discussion, and present the 2018 Hillary Rodham Clinton awards to individuals who advance women's role in creating a more peaceful and secure world.  We are a tolerant people, and we will tolerate this.  But I do wonder why no one has ever asked Hillary Clinton what she's actually accomplished for women.

WHAT OUR KIDS ARE LEARNING – FROM CAMPUS REFORM:   A California State University-Dominguez Hills lecturer recently used her political science course syllabus to assert that President Trump was elected by “appealing to hatred and bigotry,” even labeling him a “white supremacist.”  Dr. Brooke Mascagni included the language in her syllabus for an “American Political Institutions” course, which is worth three credit hours at the California institution.  “The President of the United States won the 2016 election by appealing to hatred and bigotry,” the syllabus declares, according to images obtained by Campus Reform, adding that “just about everyday, a new scandal breaks or evidence of corruption emerges.”  That is called "scholarship" in some circles.  California State is a state institution, supported by public funds.  Let's see if there's an uproar.  Don't hold your breath.

February 5, 2018       Permalink

TALK ABOUT BAD P.R. – AT 11:31 P.M. ET:   What are the Germans thinking?  From the Jerusalem Post,  based on a story in the German publication BILD: 

German technology was sold to Iranian companies and subsequently used in Syrian chemical weapons attacks, the mass-circulation BILD reported on Monday.

Germany’s Federal Office for Economic Affairs and Export Control approved a license for a company to sell military-applicable technology to Iranian firms.

The German company Krempel, located near the southern city of Stuttgart, sold electronic press boards to Iranian companies that were used in the production of rockets. The Jerusalem Post reported in 2017 that multiple German intelligence reports revealed that Iran sought chemical and biological weapons technology from the Federal Republic.

The research of human rights group Syrians for Truth and Justice, BILD and the online investigative journalist website Bellingcat showed photographs of the rocket remains with the Krempel logo and the product's signature “Made in Germany” line. The rocket debris was found after two poison gas attacks assumed to have been conducted by Syrian President Bashar Assad’s regime. Krempel confirmed the delivery of electronic technology “Presspan PSP 3040,” a material with a cellulose base used for insulation.

COMMENT:  You'd think that Germany, with its history, would know better.  But greed overcomes all.  When the Iran nuclear deal was completed, German businessmen were crawling over each other to profit from doing business with the world's greatest sponsor of terror.

February 5, 2018       Permalink

THE PRESIDENT HOLDS – AT 9:51 A.M. ET:   There were headlines at the end of last week, reporting that Mr. Trump had hit 49% in the Rasmussen poll, based presumably on his State of the Union performance.  But could it hold?

The Dems and the mainstream media joined up in their usual unholy alliance to throw everything they had at the president, and I personally expected his numbers to dip at the start of this week.  I was wrong.  From Rasmussen: 

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Monday shows that 49% of Likely U.S. Voters approve of President Trump’s job performance. Forty-nine percent (49%) also disapprove.
The latest figures include 35% who Strongly Approve of the way the president is performing and 39% who Strongly Disapprove. This gives him a Presidential Approval Index rating of -4.

All three nights of this survey now follow the president’s well-received State of the Union address last week. Both Trump’s overall approval rating and his Presidential Approval Index rating remain at their highest levels in nearly a year.  

COMMENT:  Other polls, of course, have Mr. Trump lower.  But enough polling has now come in to demonstrate that the trend is clearly upward. 

This can reverse.  The president, to paraphrase a description by Churchill of our own secretary of state, John Foster Dulles, is a bull who brings his own china shop with him.   If Mr. Trump can avoid self-inflicted wounds, and keep the economy humming, he might just pull a Republican Congress out of November's fire.

February 5, 2018       Permalink

A VERY BAD IDEA – AT 8:58 A.M. ET:  Two things about socialism – it never succeeds and it never dies.  Now, a rather depressed city in California is going in the socialist direction, as if the city fathers, mothers and non-gendered parents have discovered something great.  They have not.  From WND:

The mayor of Stockton, California, is leading an experiment with “universal basic income,” which is set to start by giving low-income residents $500 a month, no questions asked.

Mayor Michael Tubbs calls his city “ground zero” for issues like wage stagnation, rising housing prices and loss of middle-class jobs that affect the nation.

The Central Valley city went bankrupt in 2012, and for decades it has been trying to diversify its agriculture-based economy.

“I feel that as mayor it’s my responsibility to do all I could to begin figuring out what’s the best way to make sure that folks in our community have a real economic floor,” Tubbs said.

Are you loving the ‘Nunes Memo’? Get the political manifesto from the House Intel Committee chairman who wrote it.

Dorian Warren serves as co-chairman the Economic Security Project, which is contributing $1 million to the initiative. He said the goal is to gather data on the economic and social impacts of giving people a basic income.

In addition to tracking what residents do with the money, Warren said they will be monitoring how a basic income affects things like self-esteem and identity.

“What does it mean to say, ‘Here is unconditional guaranteed income just based on you being a human being?'” Warren asked.

COMMENT:  A bad idea for a number of reasons.  There's a rule of thumb in politics that, once you give a benefit, you can't take it back, because the voters will turn against you.  That's true.  It's also true that a guaranteed income has to come from taxpayers who are earning their income, leading to real resentment and social division.  It's further true that a guaranteed income never created a job or an incentive.

President Trump understands economics, and knows that the road to economic prosperity is the building of a strong, jobs-oriented economy.  That will include the redevelopment of our infrastructure, which is on his agenda.  I doubt if giving people $500 a month, with no strings attached, will build anything but a huge deficit, which the powerful California delegation in Congress will pressure Washington to pay off.

February 5,  2018     Permalink

FEBRUARY 4,  2018

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:55 P.M. ET: 

SPOOKY – FROM THE DAILY STAR (UK):  Facial recognition ID is predicted to replace cash and cards in future as a standard form of payments.  Just last week it emerged MasterCard customers will be able to pay for their shopping by using a selfie from April next year.  Mark Barnett, from Mastercard, said: “Biometric technologies perfectly meet the public’s expectation for state-of-the-art security when making a payment.
"This will be of great benefit to everyone: consumers, retailers and banks.”  Chinese HSBC consumers have been happy to flash their faces at their smartphones when paying for stuff in the past 12 months.  The Alibaba app also allows KFC customers in China to prove their identity and pay for grub by simply looking at a checkout 3D camera.   And if you decide to have plastic surgery? 

ON WINGS OF EAGLES – Those of us of the Patriot faith are a bit glum tonight, our boys having lost to an organization called the Philadelphia Eagles.  There must have been something wrong with our equipment.  It was a good game, however, and we knew that at some point the Pats would suffer a setback.  That came today.  From now on we will fall back on the old Brooklyn Dodgers slogan, "Wait 'til next year."  And next year will come, even if it takes 10 years.  By the way, no player took a knee before the game, which must have been a relief for the NFL.

TRUE PRIVATE EYES – FROM THE SUN:    A PRIVATE police force probing hundreds of crimes including murder and rape has a 100 per cent conviction rate.  The firm - Britain's first - has successfully prosecuted more than 400 criminals and is led by former Scotland Yard senior officers.  Private police officers at TM Eye have a 100 per cent conviction rate.  TM Eye is now believed to bring more private convictions than any other organisation except for the RSPCA, Daily Mail reports.  TM Eye are also looking at three murder cases that cops were unable to solve and are helping out in rape, missing persons, burglary, theft, stalking and blackmail cases.  In two years, the company has successfully convicted 403 criminals for fraud, intellectual property theft and other offences.  Sounds like the spirit of Sherlock Holmes is alive and well.  Also sounds like a great TV series.

February 4, 2018       Permalink

THE BACKLASH BUILDS – AT 2:16 P.M. ET:   I have no doubt whatever that most of the charges made by women during the current sexual-harassment season are true.  However, many others may not be true, may be exaggerated, or may be driven by the wish for a cash payment or a career boost.

Some men are being properly punished and driven from positions they abused.  But others are seeing their lives destroyed simply because someone makes a charge.  And a backlash is building.  From the New York Post: 

Men are scared, and feminists are delighted. But the urge to call out and punish male sexual transgression is bound to clash with an inescapable truth: We’re all in this together, men and women.

Consider what’s happening in the capital of Florida. Female staffers and lobbyists have found “many male legislators will no longer meet with them privately,” reported The Miami Herald. “I had a senator say, ‘I need my aide here in the room because I need a chaperone,’ ” lobbyist Jennifer Green told the paper. “I said, ‘Senator, why do you need a chaperone? . . . Do you feel uncomfortable around me?’ ‘Well,’ he said, ‘anyone can say anything with the door shut.’ ”

“I’m getting the feeling that we’re going back 20 years as female professionals,” said Green, who owns her company. “I fully anticipate I’m going to be competing with another firm that is currently owned by some male, and the deciding factor is going to be: ‘You don’t want to hire a female lobbying firm in this environment.’ ”

This kind of thinking is catching on in aggressively P.C. Silicon Valley, where men are taking to message boards like Reddit to express interest in sex segregation — sometimes labeled “Men Going Their Own Way,” or the “Man-o-Sphere.” How will that work out for women in the tech industry, where they already face substantial challenges?

Across industries, “Several major companies have told us they are now limiting travel between the genders,” Johnny Taylor, president of the Society for Human Resource Management, told the Chicago Tribune, citing execs who tell men not to go on business trips or share rental cars with women co-workers. UCLA psychologist Kim Elsesser, the author of “Sex and the Office,” sees a nascent “sex partition.” If men start to back away from women, at least in professional settings, it’s difficult to see how that will aid the feminist cause.

As is characteristic of movements led by the left in general, #MeToo faces the prospect of being seen to push too far, too fast.

COMMENT:  It may sort itself out, but what is needed now is some maturity, not just slogans.  And what is clearly needed is a set of priorities.  Women at physical risk come first, absolutely, and women at financial risk follow close behind.  When some boorish jerk has your paycheck, and you're trying to support two kids as a single mother, that's serious.  As for the rest, a variety of procedures can be worked out.  But not every adolescent comment or frat house pat requires that a man's (or woman's) life be destroyed.

February 4, 2018       Permalink

GOP MORALE RISES – AT 1:48 P.M. ET:   Rising poll numbers are fueling a major boost in the morale of the Republican Party.  From The Hill:

Republicans are feeling better about their prospects in the midterm elections, buoyed by recent polls that show their numbers improving.  An ebullient President Trump touted the shift in public sentiment reflected in recent polls during a joint Senate-House Republican retreat in West Virginia this week.  

“I just looked at some numbers, you’ve even done better than you thought,” Trump told lawmakers, citing poll numbers he discussed Thursday with National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) Chairman Steve Stivers (R-Ohio).

“The numbers are pretty good and that’s one example of how things are getting better,” Stivers told reporters after discussing polling numbers with Trump. 

Stivers said the bump in Trump’s approval rating is a good sign for Republicans running for reelection.

“No president in their second year has seen their approval rating go up except now this one,” Stivers noted.

GOP lawmakers discussed the favorable turn in poll numbers during their retreat.

Pollsters David Winston and Myra Miller of the Winston Group gave a presentation to lawmakers Wednesday evening entitled “Middle Class Americans’ Views of the Tax Plan: The Opportunity for 2018.” 

A Monmouth University Poll released Wednesday showed that Trump’s approval rating had jumped 10 points compared to last month, while the Democratic advantage on the generic ballot had shrunk to 2 percentage points.

A nationwide Monmouth survey in December showed Democrats with a 15-point advantage on the generic ballot.

COMMENT:  Look, it's awfully early.  The election is in November.  Still, after months of being told how disliked the president is, and how out-of-favor the Republicans are, it's encouraging to see the numbers change the way they have. The mainstream media is approaching hysterics.  Poll results are delivered to Democratic headquarters in Washington with supplies of Zoloft.   Some on the left see these as the End Times for atheists. 

I'm loving it all.

February 4,  2018     Permalink

REMARKABLE – AT 11:53 A.M. ET:  It is Super Sunday, but not, apparently, for everyone.  From Fox: 

A growing number of Americans have decided they have better things to do with their time on Super Bowl Sunday than support a professional football league that doesn't have the decency to honor the national anthem.

American Legion and VFW posts, restaurants and bars, and even a bowling alley have decided they will not broadcast the Super Bowl game in their establishments -- out of respect for veterans and law enforcement.

A giant electronic sign outside the Oneota Veterans Club in New York reads, “In honor of our country, our flag, our veterans."

The Knights of Columbus chapter in Longview, Texas decided to end a decades-old tradition of broadcasting the game -- over their "disgust" with the national anthem protests.

"The veterans are especially aggravated by the course of events. This especially hits us as an insult when people are disrespectful of our flag and national anthem," chapter member Vance Lowery told television station KLTV.

VFW posts across the country have also joined the national Super Bowl Sunday boycott.

"They're disrespecting our flag and our national anthem so we no longer watch NFL," VFW Post 8951 member Bob Shank told the York Daily Record. "We have a bunch of veterans here who fought for that flag, fought for that national anthem.”

COMMENT:  We don't yet know just how extensive the boycott is.   And while these local actions are small, they could, if they grow, eventually show up in the television ratings, which are key to the financial success of the NFL.

I'll watch the game, but the NFL really can't absorb much more bad publicity.

February 4,  2018     Permalink