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JUNE 3,  2018

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 10:46 P.M. ET: 

LOOK WHO'S COMING TO DINNER – FROM THE DAILY MAIL:   A time traveller who believes he is from the year 6491 but got stuck in 2018 when his time machine broke down, has allegedly passed a lie detector test.  James Oliver's story was doubted but paranormal experts say they were blown away when they put it to the test, because the results showed he was telling the truth.  Mr Oliver claims he lives more than centuries in the future but was sent back in time...‘Your years are different to mine,' he says in an anonymous video which blurs out his face.  'Where I'm from, the years are longer.  'My planet is further away from the sun than yours is, so it takes longer to get around.  'But we have gifted mathematicians who work to calculate our years from those from other civilisations.'   It's being reported that the Democrats want him to run for president as a marginalized minority.  Time travellers have had a tough time in America.

REALITY CREEPS IN – FROM REUTERS:  LONDON (Reuters) - The threat posed by Islamist militants to Britain is expected to remain high for the next two years and could even rise, the interior ministry said on Sunday, on the first anniversary of an attack that killed eight people in central London.  The current threat level to Britain is assessed as severe, meaning an attack is highly likely. The government said it had foiled 25 Islamist militant plots since June 2013 - 12 of those since March 2017 - and was currently handling over 500 live operations.  Britain will publish a revised counter-terrorism strategy on Monday designed to cope with what it said was a shift in the threats the country faces as militants of all ideologies adopt new tactics.  "In summary we expect the threat from Islamist terrorism to remain at its current, heightened level for at least the next two years, and that it may increase further," the ministry said in a statement.  The threat level was raised to "critical", its highest, twice in 2017.  I sometimes feel that the Brits, under Conservative leadership, are taking terrorism more seriously than we are.  But their Labour Party is decidedly pro-Islamic, and, if it should ever gain power, can cripple Britain's defenses.

A WIN – FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER:  More than a month after a statue of Thomas Jefferson was vandalized at Hofstra University and an extensive campaign to remove it from campus, the school’s president has announced that the founding father’s visage will remain.  In April, Hofstra students on either side of the issue held dueling protests, with some students holding up the American flag, and others hoisting signs reading “RAPIST” and “SLAVER.” Tensions peaked later that month, and anti-Jefferson activists ultimately resorted to vandalizing the Jefferson statue with spray paint.  Hofstra University President Stuart Rabinowitz apparently put the issue to bed on May 30, releasing a message announcing that the statue would remain on campus.  “After consultation with students, faculty, administration, alumni, trustees, and other friends of the University, I have decided that the Thomas Jefferson statue will remain where it is at the entrance of the Sondra and David S. Mack Student Center,” Rabinowitz wrote.  Jefferson was a flawed man, but a great man, whose vision was critical to making the end of slavery possible.  His flaws should be noted and studied, but not judged entirely from the perspective of almost two centuries after he lived.

June 3, 2018        Permalink  

NO LAUGHTER – AT 7:23 P.M. ET:  We write often here about political correctness.  It has many negative effects, but one we don't normally think about is the impact on comedians who are engaged to perform on college campuses.  Turns out it deadens them as well.  From Campus Reform: 

Comedians are becoming increasingly reluctant to perform on college campuses due to a sensitive culture of political correctness, and college bookers don't seem to mind.

According to VICE News report published last week, several successful comedians, including Judy Gold, Jerry Seinfeld, and Chris Rock, now avoid going to college campuses because their jokes can be deemed offensive.

“Why is it that everyone has to adjust to everyone else? Don’t hire me if you don’t want to hear what I have to say,” Gold told the publication.

When asked to explain how she would react if her jokes offended an audience member, Gold pointed out that broad jokes about traumatic experiences are not meant to target individuals in the audience.

“The joke is not about you. You have to learn how to be in this world. The world doesn’t have to adjust for you,” she told VICE. “You don’t tell a comic what topics they can discuss on stage; it’s ridiculous. When people tell me not to do something, it makes me want to do it.”

According to the report, the content of a comedian’s campus performances is often decided by university bookers, who also negotiate the terms of the contract with comics who wish to do standup for students.

“Every time we put our label, or any time we put our name on an event it is now an extension of an entire campus climate that we are trying to create,” Kat Michael, a Simmons College booker, told VICE.

“When I am working on a contract, especially with the comedian, I’m very upfront in saying, ‘you know, transphobic language isn’t going to be tolerated—if you say something in your set, like, we reserve the right in our contract to have a conversation with you about payment and I will also pull the microphone,” Michael added.

The booker explained that comedians who have made offensive jokes on sensitive topics in the past would be asked to remove them from the performance, if they were even invited to campus at all.

“[If] I knew that this comic had a bit [where] they made light of sexual assault, I would either ask them to completely remove that from the set or we just wouldn't book them. And that’s happened before,” Michael said.

COMMENT:  This is an arena where common sense is needed.  In fact, there have always been standards of speech for performers, and those standards depend on the venue.  On commercial television, some years back, there were serious Standards and Practices departments whose word was law.  Standards in recent times, in television, have declined.

People expect, and have a right to expect, greater latitude for comics on college campuses.  The campus should be a free and open place.  You're not being beamed into someone's living room.  Your audience is young and not captive.  And yet, restrictions on campuses are now so great that all the spirit, all the bite, all the real humor can easily be taken out.

A documentary was made several years ago called "Can We Take a Joke?" focusing on the problems of comedians trying to entertain at a time of rigid political correctness. Comedians interviewed in the film told how they were appalled by the lack of a sense of humor in today's students.  That sense of humor had been washed out of them by the campus thought police.  Common sense was out the window.  The concept of a dull, gray society was, and is, very much in.

Whatever happened to laughter?  To smiles?  To laughing at one's self or one's group?  There is something terribly totalitarian about what's being taught to our kids.  It's the same thing taught in any dictatorship.  You may not say this, or think that.  We will report you.  You will be shamed.

Is that America?

June 3, 2018       Permalink 

A POSITIVE WORD FROM SCOTT RASMUSSEN – AT 1:19 P.M. ET:   We're not high on "prediction" stories here, but occasionally one comes along that makes sense.  Scott Rasmussen, master pollster and analyst, is predicting that Republicans will pick up seats in November's midterm elections.  From RealClearPolitics.com: 

Now, with the elections just six months away, it seems that Republican are more likely to gain seats in the Senate rather than lose control.

Sure, it's still possible that the Dems could pick up seats in Arizona and Nevada. But, such an outcome is far from a sure thing as both races are now toss-ups.

And, even if Schumer's party wins both of those races, the chances of successfully defending all of the vulnerable Democratic incumbents is increasingly in doubt. The Dems are playing defense hoping to hang on to five Senate seats in states that President Trump won by double digits -- West Virginia, Indiana, Missouri, North Dakota, and Montana. On top of that, Florida Governor Rick Scott has entered the fray to challenge Democratic Senator Bill Nelson in a toss-up state. Early indications are that Scott has all the energy and momentum in the race.

The numbers clearly favor the GOP. If, for example, the Democrats pick up BOTH toss-up races in Arizona and Nevada, the Republicans need to win just one of the other six competitive races to keep the Senate at a 50-50 tie. With Vice President Mike Pence empowered to cast the deciding vote, the GOP would remain in control.

At this moment in time, however, it seems like the Republicans should expect to do much better than a mere 50-50 tie in the Senate. There is certainly a chance they could win at least one of the toss-up Senate races in either Arizona or Nevada (especially if Martha McSally wins the Republican nomination in Arizona).

COMMENT:  Rasmussen gives real analysis, not speculation, but we must caution that the election is five months away.  President Trump's poll numbers will affect the result.  They are rising slightly right now, but that could change.

There are solid reasons to be optimistic, but Republicans must run as if they're 20 points behind. 

June 3, 2018       Permalink

A DISGRACE AND A DISASTER – AT 12:41 P.M. ET:  You may think that this is a local story, a New York story.  It is not.  It is a national and international story, and critically important.

New York City has had, for decades, a group of schools generally called the "special" high schools.  They are schools of excellence.  Admission is by test.  There are no quotas.  They are world famous.  The High School of Music and Art, known as the "Fame" School.  The Bronx High School of Science.  Stuyvesant, one of the most competitive schools in the world. 

Over the years there have been attempts by resentful people and self-interested politicians to destroy the schools by lowering standards, so as to bring in students who can't make the cut.  Fortunately, parents and faculty have stood there, like the proverbial stone wall, to maintain these educational gems.

Now, New York's Marxist mayor, Bill de Blasio, a former Castroite, and his new, radical schools chief, are making a major new push to destroy those schools, on grounds that the student bodies do not "look" like New York.  In other words, too many Asians.  Too many kids who come from cultures that emphasize study and excellence.  From the New York Post: 

Mayor de Blasio on Saturday unveiled a plan to boost black and Latino enrollment at the city’s eight specialized high schools — and wants to scrap the ultra-competitive admissions test outright.

In an op-ed for education news site Chalkbeat, de Blasio announced that 20 percent of seats would be reserved for low-income applicants.

Fact:  A goodly number of the current students are low-income, and qualify for free lunches, but they just aren't members of the mayor's favorite groups.

Kids in the Department of Education’s “Discovery” program who score just below the admissions cut-off would be given one of those saved seats, according to the plan.

In addition, De Blasio said he will fight to eventually replace the current single-test system with a new set of admissions criteria based on middle-school class rank and state test scores.

What a racket.  Kids will be admitted based on "class rank" in schools where a lot of kids don't even show up.

“The Specialized High School Admissions Test isn’t just flawed – it’s a roadblock to justice, progress and academic excellence,” de Blasio wrote.

It's worked brilliantly. 

De Blasio said his proposals – if fully realized – would eventually induce a massive demographic shift at the specialized high schools.

“With these reforms, we expect our premier public high schools to start looking like New York City,” he wrote. “Approximately 45 percent of students would be Latino or black.”

Under the current system, Asian kids predominate at the city’s top three high schools.

They make up 74 percent of the population at Stuyvesant HS, 66 percent at Bronx Science and 61 percent at Brooklyn Tech, according to the Department of Education. At the Queens HS for Science at York College, 82 percent of kids are Asian.

And I say, more power to them.  These kids come from immigrant families and from cultures that emphasize academic achievement.  They've worked their heads off, and without complaint.  And now the mayor will tell them that they're just not members of the right group.  That's justice?

Alumni have long argued that the current merit system guarantees academic rigor. But de Blasio undercut that notion in his op-ed.

“The new system we’re fighting for will raise the bar at the specialized high schools in every way,” he wrote. “The pool of talent is going to expand widely and rapidly. That’s going to up the level of competition.”

Yeah, right.  What we really need are affirmative-action engineers designing our bridges. 

There will be massive opposition to these unnecessary changes.  The mayor complained that most blacks and Latinos cannot afford the tutoring for the admission tests.  In fact, most of the Asian students can't afford it either.  If extra help is needed, make that a priority.  Give any kid who wants to compete the tutoring that is necessary.  That's where you begin.  Bring the kids up to the needed level, then demand that they perform.

This story is important because New York still has substantial influence in education.  The special schools are among the major reasons that the New York City school system, until the wreckage of the 1960s, was known as the gem of urban education in the United States.  The special schools survived the carnage and have retained their status.  If they are destroyed by political correctness, that will give license to other, similar schools in other areas to be destroyed as well.

June 3,  2018     Permalink 

JUNE 2,  2018

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

THEY CAN HAVE HIM – FROM DAILY CALLER:  Former White House aide Ben Rhodes, who served as Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications and advised former President Barack Obama on foreign policy issues, will start his new job on Sunday as a politics contributor for MSNBC and NBC News.  MSNBC’s public relations department made the announcement on Twitter on Saturday, noting that Rhodes will make his official debut on Sunday’s “Meet the Press” and Monday’s “All In With Chris Hayes.”  A man with no qualifications for the job was made deputy national security adviser for Obama, and boasted that he engaged in deception to sell the Iran nuclear deal.  He'll do well in the fake- news business.

CAUGHT – FROM THE WASHINGTON TIMES:  The New York Times issued a correction Wednesday about the crowd size at President Trump’s rally after the president challenged the paper’s mistake, acknowledging the audience in Nashville, Tennessee, was more than five times larger than The Times initially reported.  In its article online, The Times said an earlier version of the story “cited an incorrect figure for the number of people attending President Trump’s rally.”  “While no exact figure is available, the fire marshal’s office estimated that approximately 5,500 people attended the rally, not about 1,000 people,” the correction stated.  Mr. Trump had accused the Times Wednesday morning of lying about the crowd size at the arena where he was campaigning Tuesday night for GOP Senate candidate Marsha Blackburn.  A discrepancy that large cannot simply be called a mistake.  If it was a typo, the reporter writing the story, or the editor editing it, would have discovered the gaffe immediately.  This looks very mean-spirited, and an internal investigation by The Times is called for.

TERRIFIC! – FROM PAGE SIX:   “Sherlock” star Benedict Cumberbatch fought off a gang of four muggers as they beat up a defenseless Deliveroo cyclist.  The actor, 41, leapt from an Uber car and waded in after spotting the attack near detective Sherlock Holmes’s fictional home in London’s Baker Street.  The gang fled. Uber driver Manuel Dias said: “The cyclist was lucky, Benedict’s a superhero.”  The star leapt to the rescue as the yobs punched the defenseless cyclist and smashed him over the head with a bottle.  Witnesses told how Benedict jumped from an Uber car in which he was riding with wife Sophie Hunter and sprinted into the fray, yelling: “Leave him alone.”  He dragged the four muggers off their bloodied victim. They then tried to punch Benedict, but he fended them off before they fled.  Give him a special Oscar for sheer guts.  Let's see if he gets any respect in the media for risking his life. 

June 2,  2018     Permalink   

HE SPEAKS AGAIN – AT 11:24 P.M. ET:  John Kerry has now assessed Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign.  You may recall that Kerry was the 2004 Democratic presidential candidate.  From Daily Mail:

John Kerry has suggested that Hillary Clinton contributed to her own downfall in the 2016 presidential election by encouraging the Russians to hack America.

The former Secretary of State said that Russian President Vladimir Putin told him he was 'incensed' by a speech Clinton gave in 2014 comparing him to Hitler.

Kerry said Clinton's comments made Putin feel he was under attack and that interfering in the US election was a way to even the score with America.

In an interview at the New York City BookExpo, Kerry also praised President Donald Trump and said that he would 'applaud' his engagement with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

But he sharply criticized Trump for pulling of the deal with Iran on nuclear weapons - which Kerry brokered - and said he was 'deeply, deeply, deeply concerned' about his presidency.

Kerry made his comments at the major book industry conference while promoting his forthcoming memoir, Every Day Is Extra.

COMMENT:  I look forward to Kerry's book.  I have bouts of insomnia and I'm sure, after reading two pages by John Kerry, that it will be cured forever.

June 2, 2018       Permalink

CALIFORNIA, HERE WE COME – AT 2:29 P.M. ET:  There is a California primary on Tuesday.  It's an odd primary in which the top two finishers go on to the gubernatorial election, regardless of party.  So you can have two Democrats running against each other in November, or, theoretically, two Republicans. 

Some Republicans believe they have a reasonable chance of winning the governorship this year.  But first they must get a GOP candidate into one of the top two slots on Tuesday.  From Fox: 

California gubernatorial candidate John Cox (R) is edging closer to frontrunner Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) after an endorsement from President Trump. 

Cox is the leading Republican for the June 5th "jungle" primary, in which the top two vote-getters advance to the general election regardless of party.  

Newsom, the former mayor of San Francisco, holds a nine-point lead on Cox, according to Real Clear Politics' polling average.

Outgoing Gov. Jerry Brown (D) has sparked controversy in the state with the passage of a sanctuary law, which critics argue hinders the ability of federal authorities to apprehend criminal aliens. 

Cox said on "America's Newsroom" Friday that both he and the president are "businessmen" and that 19 states have Republican businessmen or women as their governors.

"We get the job done. We don't engage in a lot of partisan bickering. ... That's what the president is doing," he said, touting the new jobs report.

Cox said he believes Californians "are looking for change" and are becoming more and more concerned about the state's affordability after years of Democrat-led tax hikes, including on gasoline. 

"I think they're finally getting it. We don't want to become the Venezuela of America. We don't want government running our lives completely," he said. 

COMMENT:  California used to be a Republican state.  It was the state that elected Ronald Reagan the governor twice.  In recent years it has drifted strongly blue.

Will this year break the pattern?  I have no idea, but I'll be watching the returns Tuesday night. 

June 2, 2018       Permalink

YIPPEE – AT 12:51 P.M. :  The good news on the economy keeps coming, like a desirable avalanche.  From Breitbart: 

The U.S. economy is expanding at a 4.8 percent annualized rate in the second quarter, the Atlanta Federal Reserve’s GDPNow forecast model showed on Friday.

The forecast has been climbing higher following the release of a series of good economic data. On May 25, the measure foresaw four percent GDP growth. This rose to 4.7 percent Thursday and ticked even higher on Friday following the better than expected jobs report for May.

The Atlanta Fed forecasts a big boost in private sector fixed investment, which includes capital investment in machinery, land, buildings, vehicles, and technology. Earlier, the Atlanta Fed saw this growing at 4.6 percent. But following the release Friday of a construction spending report from the U.S. Census Bureau and the Manufacturing ISM Report On Business from the Institute for Supply Management, this was upgraded to 5.4 percent growth.

COMMENT:  Three percent is considered solid.  A 4.8 percent rise is superb.  Of course the Democrats, in the person of Nancy Pelosi, are claiming that the economy is not good at all, that we are facing disaster, and that only Nancy herself and Maxine Waters can save us. 

I don't think the country agrees.

June 2,  2018     Permalink