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JULY 14,  2018

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

ANTI-TRUMP CRAZINESS – FROM BIZPACREVIEW.COM:  Instead of celebrating President Donald Trump’s historic meeting Friday with Queen Elizabeth II, leftists took to social media to complain about his alleged lack of matters. According to them, Trump spoke incorrectly, walked incorrectly and probably even breathed incorrectly.  Consider the following clip from the The Daily Telegraph that complained about the president and his wife, first lady Melania Trump, not bowing to the queen when they first met her:  The Telegraph shared the video to Twitter Friday afternoon and captioned it with the question, “Did Donald Trump forget to bow to the Queen?”  In response, leftist airheads rushed to lambaste Trump for being a “just plain disrespectful” and “ignorant” “man-child,” among other things.  Conservatives then swooped in to drop some truth bombs on them, including this one from David Boaz of the Cato Institute: “We’re not her subjects.”  Bingo.   Of course not.  By tradition, Americans don't bow to foreign royalty.  That tradition is well understood and accepted around the world, except, apparently, by ignorant leftists. 

AND HE SAYS IT – FROM AP:    US President Donald Trump confirmed this weekend that he plans to stand for election in 2020, but says he doesn’t expect a tough challenge given that, in his opinion, there is no one who could beat him.  Asked during an interview with the UK’s Mail on Sunday whether he planned to seek reelection, Trump said; “Well I fully intend to. It seems like everybody wants me to.”  “Do you see a Democrat who can possibly beat you?’ interviewer Piers Morgan, a friend of the president, asked.  “No. I don’t see anybody. I know them all and I don’t see anybody,’ Trump responded. “They do not have the right candidate.”  He's right, they don't.  But overconfidence must be avoided.  They can come up with a media-invented performer like Obama. 

LATEST FASHION NEWS – FROM AP:   PROVIDENCE, R.I. — The Navy says it will now allow servicewomen to sport ponytails and other hairstyles, reversing a policy that long forbade females from letting their hair down.  Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson said it makes the Navy more inclusive.  Many black women had asked for changes to the female grooming standards. A female sailor, Yeoman First Class LaToya Jones, announced the new policy during a Facebook Live event Tuesday with Richardson. The new standards went into effect Wednesday.  Lock hairstyles, or ropelike strands, are also now allowed. Wider hair buns too. And women can wear ponytails while in uniform.  Capt. Thurraya Kent is the senior member of the working group that recommended the changes. The group told the Navy that adding grooming options would eliminate a distraction, be more inclusive of different hair textures and enable people to keep their hair natural instead of processing it chemically.  Okay, cool.  Now let's spend at least five minutes on warfighting training.

July 14, 2018        Permalink

THE END FOR DEPARTMENT STORES? – AT 3:06 P.M. ET:  Department stores, long the symbol of civilized shopping, endless variety and often ornate decorations and holiday displays, are fading, replaced by online buying, discount stores, and stores featuring items from one brand.

Here in New York, probably the American capital of department stores, going to one of these institutions was often considered a special treat, especially for kids at Christmastime.   Ah yes, I remember it well.  But how long will it continue?  From the New York Post: 

I’m going to miss Lord & Taylor like mad when the Fifth Avenue flagship closes next year. It isn’t only because of the unlikely bargains I scored on its often-deserted men’s floors — a red vinyl Perry Ellis-label jacket, marked down from $79.95 to $39.95 that strangers hilariously mistake for Armani, and a wool winter coat as good as any for $49.99.

I won’t miss the once-charming but more recently cheap-looking holiday windows that weren’t worth waiting on line for. But Lord & Taylor, like every big department store, offered a welcoming civility that softened the city’s rough edges. New York will be slightly less human without it, however obsolete its business model. Never again will the public enjoy the store’s grand main floor with its noble vaulted ceiling, arched mirrors and stately columns.

The shutdown is one of up to 10 Lord & Taylor closures of a total 50 stores planned by chain owner, Hudson’s Bay Company. It comes amidst a nationwide department store apocalypse. Hudson’s Bay, which owns 488 stores including Saks Fifth Avenue, is battling high debt, declining sales and falling stock prices.

Another industry giant, Macy’s Inc., which also owns Bloomingdale’s, has closed 14 percent of its stores since 2014, while its same-store sales in 2017 fell 4.3 percent compared with 2016. J.C. Penney closed 138 locations, or 14 percent of its stores, last year.

Jeffrey Roseman, vice chairman of Newmark Knight Frank’s retail-brokerage division, told The Post, “The need for an eight-story, multi-hundred-thousand square-foot department store in major cities is limited at best.”

Noting that most main floors are turned over to cosmetics, Roseman said, “What woman wants to buy fragrance there? They can go into Sephora, Ulta or Blue Mercury and get the same stuff cheaper and be out in 10 minutes.”

COMMENT:  It's sad.  I wonder if the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade will survive.  Here in White Plains we have Nordstrom, Neiman Marcus, Macy's, and Bloomingdale's.  There used to be a Saks Fifth Avenue, but it closed down.  I rarely go into any of those stores, and they don't seem to have much impact any longer.  The "sexiest" shop in town is the Apple Store.   

Today you can order something online, and get it, often with free shipping, in a couple of days.  Sometimes even overnight.  And you don't fight the crowds.  The in-stock inventories are enormous.

But we'll miss the old places.  Quiet and civilized.  Browse as you wish.  Easy returns. 

And Santa Claus.

July 14, 2018       Permalink 

HIS HONOR? – AT 2:20 P.M. ET:   The Muslim mayor of London has been active denouncing President Trump, and allowing an anti-Trump balloon to fly over his city.  But now His Honor is getting serious questions on the way he spends his time.  Long overdue for this fool.  From Fox: 

London Mayor Sadiq Khan slammed President Trump’s criticism of him as “preposterous” after allowing a giant Trump balloon at anti-Trump protests in London, but critics question whether the mayor should be devoting his energy to tackling crime rather than “embarrassing” the city in front of the whole world.

Trump reignited the feud with Khan in an interview with The Sun newspaper, saying the Mayor of London “has done a terrible job” when it comes to terrorism and crime. “I think he has done a bad job on crime, if you look, all of the horrible things going on there, with all of the crime that is being brought in,” he said.

Khan called the comments “preposterous” on the BBC’s Today program on Friday, claiming that violent crime has risen across the country and London has been forced to tackle the issue with a smaller police budget.

But crime in London persists on epidemic proportions as murder rate soared by 44 percent, with 157 homicides committed compared to 109 the previous year, according to official statistics from the Metropolitan Police.

A former ambassador to the U.S., Sir Christopher Meyer, was the victim of a violent attack against him at a central London underground station this week. “I’m absolutely shocked by the level of the brutality,” his wife, Baroness Meyer, told the Times of London. “They really beat him. It’s appalling — like something you would see in a war zone."

Earlier this year, for the first time in modern history, London overtook New York in the number of murders. In February, London’s police investigated 15 murders while New York saw 11 homicides. In March, the Metropolitan Police murder numbers increased further to 22, while NYPD’s jumped to 21. The City of New York has since taken back the lead however.

London is also facing the rise of shocking acid attacks, skyrocketing by more than 78 per cent over the past two years, with 465 such offenses in 2017, up from 260 in 2015, according to police figures obtained by the Evening Standard.

This led to frustrated Londoners airing their concerns about the spiraling crime in the city, all while Khan remains preoccupied with feuding with Trump.

“This guy spends his week getting a balloon of Donald Trump in a nappy put in the air in central London instead of helping us with severe issues. I just think he’s so worried about himself, his reputation and PR rather than portraying the country, the city in the best way can be and making it safe for the citizens,” London business leader Mark Wright, who won the UK's version of The Apprentice, told Fox News.

COMMENT:   One of the things many public figures never understand is that, when they seek publicity, they get attention...and the attention isn't always what they'd anticipated.   The mayor of London is an embarrassment, but he's multicultural, and thus supported by the elites.  In the meantime, London is deteriorating.

July 14, 2018       Permalink

THE SUMMIT – AT 12:31 P.M. ET:  The president is about to meet Vladimir Putin.  The Democrats, who stood by and watched Putin eat Barack Obama alive, are all aflutter.  We must not trust Trump alone with the monster, they say.

No problem with Obama, a kid from Chicago with a pro-Communist upbringing.  No problem at all.

I think that Trump has been too flippant in his complimentary comments about Putin.  It's the president's style to exaggerate, and it's not a good thing.  At the same time, I wish some journalists would put our relations with Putin into some perspective.  But when you think all history started two weeks ago, that's hard.

In 1960 an American U2 spy plane went down over the Soviet Union.  It was a major international incident, leading to vast amounts of Soviet anger directed at the United States for sending a spy plane over its territory in the first place.  (In fact, we'd been doing it for several years.)  But despite the anger, Moscow's statements were framed in such a way as to let President Eisenhower save some face.  The Russians blamed Allen Dulles, the director of Central Intelligence.  Eisenhower's relations with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev became bumpy for a time, but the bumps were overcome.

That's pretty much the way the international system operates.  Countries spy on each other, cheat on each other, plant false stories, but the system has to function.  Putin is not our friend.  He's a thug, trained by the KGB, but we have to deal with him.  If he deals with him stupidly, the president must be blamed, even though Field Marshal Obama never was.  The press covered for him.  I have reasonable confidence, though, that Trump, not exactly an angel himself, will know how to handle Putin, or at least keep him at a distance, while still trying to gain concessions.

Consider, please, Trump's recent summit with North Korean big dealer Kim Jong Un.  Trump's Democratic critics, who never gave a hoot about Korea when Obama was in office, accused Trump of being rolled by Kim, being used by him, and getting nothing in return.  In fact, when the first serious negotiating session was held following that summit, Secretary Pompeo laid down the law to the Norks, making it clear there would be no concessions or lifting of sanctions unless North Korea met our demands.  Trump had given up nothing.

We await the summit.  And we await the press hysteria that will accompany it.

July 14,  2018     Permalink

JULY 13,  2018

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:56 P.M. ET: 

NEXT VACATION – FROM CNBC:  SEATTLE, July 12 (Reuters) - Jeff Bezos's rocket company plans to charge passengers about $200,000 to $300,000 for its first trips into space next year, two people familiar with its plans told Reuters.  Potential customers and the aerospace industry have been eager to learn the cost of a ticket on Blue Origin's New Shepard space vehicle, to find out if it is affordable and whether the company can generate enough demand to make a profit on space tourism.  Executives at the company, started by Amazon.com Inc founder Bezos in 2000, told a business conference last month they planned test flights with passengers on the New Shepard soon, and to start selling tickets next year.  They throw in lunch and a bag of peanuts. 

MUCH ADO ABOUT...? – You heard the announcement today that a number of Russian intelligence operatives have been indicted for trying to interfere with our 2016 elections.  First, the announcement, coming only three days before the President Trump's summit with Vladimir Putin, was grossly inappropriate.  Appearances are important, and the timing looked like an attempt to disrupt the meeting or embarrass the president.  Aside from that, I'm weary of journalists and others being shocked, shocked, that the Russkies attempted to tamper with our vote.  It's wrong, of course, but it's been going on through one method or another for decades.  It usually takes the form of attempts to influence voters through fake-news programs.  And the Russians aren't the only culprits.  The Brits ran major influence campaigns to try to get pre-Pearl Harbor America involved in World War II.  The Saudis are always active.  The Israelis are masters.  It's a kind of international pastime.  We can protest, we have to keep our guard up, but let's not get carried away with overwrought displays of anguish.

GETTING SERIOUS ABOUT SPACE – FROM BLOOMBERG:  (Bloomberg) -- NASA’s administrator is a strong defender of President Donald Trump’s proposals for space -- including an armed force and a permanent presence on the moon -- and says he wants Americans to realize how much their well-being depends on what happens far above Earth.  “Every banking transaction requires a GPS signal for timing,” Jim Bridenstine said in an interview. “You lose the GPS signal and guess what you lose? You lose banking.”  “If you look at what space is, it’s not that much different than the ocean,” added Bridenstine, who made 333 aircraft-carrier landings as a Navy pilot. “It’s an international domain that has commerce that needs to be protected.”  This administration is serious about space, reversing the sleepy attitude of the Obama administration.  Obama once told his NASA head that the mission of NASA was Muslim outreach.  Not any longer. 

July 13, 2018       Permalink

TRUMP IN BRITAIN – AT 7:46 A.M. ET:   President Trump, king of the insult, emperor of the undiplomatic gesture, is in Great Britain, which prides itself on pomp, circumstance, and smooth diplomacy.   Trump is not popular in Britain, but thus far any protests have been muted.  Piers Morgan gives a sharp analysis of this unusual American president.  From Fox: 

English journalist Piers Morgan reacted to his country's public displays of protest against President Donald Trump and its love for former President Barack Obama.

"He's a rare president," Morgan, editor-in-chief of Daily Mail, said. "[Trump has] a complete revulsion of what he sees as conventional political posturing."

Morgan also told Martha MacCallum that Obama is seen as a "saintly figure" in much of the United Kingdom, while many detest Trump.

However, Morgan invited Britons to take a closer look at their love for Obama: "He deported three million illegal immigrants... [and] kept Guantanamo Bay open for eight years."

"If [Britons] actually looked at him pragmatically, what did he actually achieve?" Morgan asked.

He said that Obama's tenure was "massively overhyped" as much as Trump's has been the reverse.

Morgan said that, much like the United States is polarized between the liberal coasts and more conservative Middle America, Britain becomes less progressive as you move north from liberal London.

MacCallum noted that London is where much of the anti-Trump protests are taking place.

Morgan said that Trump is definitively honored to be meeting Queen Elizabeth II, who he said was one of the president's Scotch-born mother Mary's "idols."

COMMENT:  Well said.  The overhyped Obama, interestingly enough, is kind of fading away in the United States.  Do you hear him mentioned much?  Do people weep over his absence?  For eight years Barack Obama set American back.  The jury is out on Trump, but the man is getting things done, and he certainly fights for us.

I hope he doesn't insult the Queen, or offer to redo her palace at a discount.  Other than that, what can go wrong?

July 13, 2018        Permalink

I LOVE IT – AT 7:31 A.M. ET:  Don't you love it when Republicans think strategically?  Don't blink.  You might miss it, but occasionally it happens.  From AP:

Republican leaders are moving toward having a House vote on liberal Democratic legislation to abolish the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.

The campaign-season vote would be aimed at embarrassing Democrats. Many Democrats consider the measure a miscalculation that could help Republicans paint Democratic candidates as extreme.

Washington state Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal is a sponsor and says its backers will vote "no."

She says the measure is aimed at focusing attention on the issue, not actually eliminating the agency.

Liberal activists consider ICE a symbol of harsh immigration policies by President Donald Trump.

A GOP aide said No. 3 House Republican leader Steve Scalise got strong backing Thursday when he suggested having the vote.

COMMENT:  Good move by the GOP.  The fact that the Dems plan to vote "no" simply demonstrates their cynicism and dishonesty.   Of course they really want to vote "yes," but are afraid of being called soft on crime.  The farce will be detected, and Republicans will use it.

Oh, by the way, Rep. Pramila Jayapal is from Seattle and is a committed socialist.  As we've noted, it's becoming the rage in the Democratic Party.  Gets you invited to the best parties in Cuba.

July 13,  2018     Permalink