Ed Sheeran on Jimmy Kimmel Live

My son was there last night. Sheeran came on around 6:15pm.



And the interview is here, "Ed Sheeran on Elton John," and "Ed Sheeran's Sleepovers with Courteney Cox and Jamie Foxx."

The Obama Depression: In Poll, 7-in-10 Say Economy Has Permanently Changed for the Worse Since '09

The news articles and the survey report don't say it, but the findings from the new Rutgers University poll on the economy are nothing less than a devastating indictment of the Obama administration and its inept --- indeed, malicious --- handling of the economy since the crash of 2008.

Obama's 2009 stimulus bill was a boondoggle that proved Keynesian economics doesn't work.

Today, more than 5 and a half years since Obama took office, the national unemployment rate stands at 6.2 percent, and the most recent report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that unemployment in July increased in 30 states. We're still stuck in a tepid recovery, and Americans are hopping mad about it.

Here's the Rutgers report, "Unhappy, Worried, and Pessimistic: Americans in the Aftermath of the Great Recession":

The protracted and uneven recovery from the Great Recession has led most Americans to conclude that the U.S. economy has undergone a permanent change for the worse. Seven in ten now say the recession’s impact is permanent, up from half in 2009 when the recession officially ended. Much of this is rooted in direct experience. Fully one-quarter of the public says there has been a major decline in their quality of life owing to the recession, and 42 percent say they have less in salary and savings than when the recession began. Despite five years of recovery, sustained job growth, and reductions in the number of unemployed workers, Americans are not convinced that the economy is improving. Only one in three thinks the U.S. economy has gotten better in the last year and only one-quarter thinks it will improve next year. Moreover, just one in six Americans believe that job opportunities will be better for the next generation of workers, down from four in ten five years ago. These are some of the findings of a new survey conducted between July 24 and August 3, 2014 by the Heldrich Center with a nationally representative sample of 1,153 Americans.

Click through for the full report.

And then watch this astonishing focus group segment with pollster Frank Luntz on CBS News This Morning. The usual caveat is that focus groups are statistically insignificant, although the strong opinions held among the participants here, and the near universal disappointment among the participants, provides a crushing snapshot of the public sentiment with just over two months to go before the November midterm elections.

Jeffersonians Rally for Independence at the California Capitol

Fascinating.

At the Sacramento Bee:

After a rally at the Capitol marked by chants of “The time has come for 51!” and a surprise appearance by Assemblyman Tim Donnelly, supporters of the State of Jefferson presented their “declarations of separation” to the California Legislature on Thursday.

The declarations from Modoc and Siskiyou counties, expressing their desire to withdraw from California because of a lack of representation in Sacramento, marked the first official step in the secession movement’s long-running efforts to re-form as a new state in Northern California.
“We’re here not because we feel any ill will toward California,” said Mark Baird, a pilot and rancher from Yreka who has helped organize the Jefferson movement. “Our problem is (lawmakers) don’t have empathy for us because we’re so far away.”

Baird addressed a crowd of about 70 from across Northern California, clad in green shirts and carrying green flags bearing Jefferson’s seal. The yellow circle with two X’s stands for “double-crossed by Sacramento.”

Donnelly, a Republican from Twin Peaks in Southern California, showed up unannounced to support the rally, which frequently drew comparisons to the American Revolution through “taxation without representation” arguments and the “Don’t tread on me” snake logo.

“It’s time for another revolution,” Donnelly said. “A peaceful one.”

Keep reading.

Obama Signals No Immediate Plans to Defeat Islamic State

Actually, it's worse than "no immediate plans."

Obama admitted today that he's got no strategy to defeat ISIS.

At Twitchy, "Strategy? What strategy? Behold ‘the Obama Doctrine in one sentence’."

And at the Wall Street Journal, "Obama Says No Plans for Imminent Escalation of Operations Against Islamic State: Extremists Killed Nearly 500 This Week in One Syrian Province, Opposition Activists Say":

President Barack Obama signaled the U.S. has no immediate plans to escalate military operations against Islamic State extremists in Iraq or Syria, stressing the need to counter the group's advance while formulating a broader strategy to protect U.S. interests and allies.

Mr. Obama spoke on a day when Syrian opposition activists said the Sunni radical group had killed nearly 500 people since Sunday in the northeastern province of Raqqa, most of them Syrian troops captured on an air base seized by Islamic State fighters.

The president, who met with his national security team Thursday afternoon, said the U.S. is still developing its plan to root Islamic State out of Iraq and Syria, where it has captured large swaths of territory since June.

"We don't have a strategy yet," Mr. Obama said of potential plans for airstrikes in Syria. He said the long-term blueprint to respond to the growth of the militant group, also known as ISIS or ISIL, can't depend on U.S. actions alone.

"Rooting out a cancer like ISIL will not be quick, or easy, but I'm confident that we can and we will, working closely with our allies and our partners," Mr. Obama said.

The president walked back reports suggesting an immediate escalation of military operations, including potential airstrikes in Syria.

"We need to make sure that we've got clear plans so we're developing them," he said. He said he was more focused on military activity in Iraq and the need for a unified government in Baghdad to help combat militant forces. "My priority at this point is to make sure that the gains that ISIL made in Iraq are rolled back and that Iraq has the opportunity to govern itself effectively and secure itself," Mr. Obama said...

More.

Surfers Race to Catch Massive Waves Sparked by Hurricane Marie

It's biggest surf seen for quite some time.

At LAT, "Surfers race to catch massive waves across Southland."

More at the Costa Mesa Daily Pilot, "Newport's Wedge lives up to its reputation: 1 hurt in thundering surf: Crowds gather on Balboa Peninsula to watch the big waves as lifeguards stand ready."

And at the O.C. Register, "Monster highs: Massive summer swells bring out surf legends, gawkers, destruction,"  and "The Wedge pounds bodyboarders for 3rd straight day."

Plus, some video at WSJ, "Hurricane Marie Brings Epic Waves to Southern Calif."

Nina Agdal for Mambo Swimwear Summer 2014

She's from Denmark, a point my son noted in his 6th grade country project this last school year, heh.

At Egotastic!, "Nina Agdal Models Bikinis for Mambo, I Feel Snake Bit In My Sensitive Areas."

Buy Some Books

I'll be teaching all day. More blogging tonight.

Meanwhile, I'm still working on The Pity Party: A Mean-Spirited Diatribe Against Liberal Compassion.

Or search for more at the banner link:

Russia Sends Regular Forces Into #Ukraine

This is just bizarre.

Another reminder of bygone days, like the interwar period's Nazi run-up to WWII.

At LAT, "Ukraine says Russian armored vehicles pouring across border."

Brazil’s Valley of Beauties Appeals for Single Men

And Brazil's got some smokin' ladies down there too.

At the Telegraph UK, "Women of Noiva do Cordeiro, deep in the countryside of south-east Brazil, where men are scarce or work far away in the city, are left to shoulder the town’s burdens alone."

But read the article.

It's a bunch of controlling radical feminists at Noiva do Cordeiro. No man of self-respect would subject himself to the "rules" they've laid down. These women are going to remain lonely for a long time to come.

Election Models Converging on GOP Senate Majority

Well, I'm certainly bullish, but still, no reason to get too excited just yet.

That said, this is far-left MSNBC contributor Chris Cillizza, so you never know.

At WaPo, "All of the election models are starting to converge. And they are all pointing to a Republican Senate."

The election models are starting to converge. And they are pointing to a Republican Senate. http://t.co/BZYt0HMiw0 pic.twitter.com/CbIUddq3ZU

— Chris Cillizza (@TheFix) August 27, 2014

Maureen Dowd: Obama 'Outsourcing' Race Relations to Al Sharpton

MoDo's been on a roll lately.

At NYT, "He Has a Dream":

WASHINGTON — As he has grown weary of Washington, Barack Obama has shed parts of his presidency, like drying petals falling off a rose.

He left the explaining and selling of his signature health care legislation to Bill Clinton. He outsourced Congress to Rahm Emanuel in the first term, and now doesn’t bother to source it at all. He left schmoozing, as well as a spiraling Iraq, to Joe Biden. Ben Rhodes, a deputy national security adviser, comes across as more than a messagemeister. As the president floats in the empyrean, Rhodes seems to make foreign policy even as he’s spinning it.

But the one thing it was impossible to imagine, back in the giddy days of the 2009 inauguration, as Americans basked in their open-mindedness and pluralism, was that the first African-American president would outsource race...

Keep reading.

#USC Cornerback Josh Shaw Suspended Indefinitely for Totally Lying About 'Hero' Story — #FightOn #Trojans

At LAT, "USC's Shaw suspended indefinitely for fabricating heroic story."

And from KCAL 9 News Los Angeles:

BREAKING: USC's Josh Shaw admits to school that he lied about how he suffered his ankle injuries over the weekend. pic.twitter.com/rdHzWmrhZN

— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) August 27, 2014

#USC coach Steve Sarkiaisn on Josh Shaw: “We are extremely disappointed in Josh. He let us all down." Shaw has retained a lawyer.

— Bruce Feldman (@BruceFeldmanCFB) August 27, 2014

Let's get the focus back on Saturday's game, instead of the distractions. Get fired up for Fresno State! #FightOn #BeatTheBulldogs

— USC Trojans Football (@uscfootball) August 27, 2014

PREVIOUSLY: "'Hero' Josh Shaw Investigation Hangs Over #USC Football."

New Child Fashion Necessity for In-Style Leftist Families: Striped 'Star of David' Holocaust Tees

Perfect leftist fashion item with a 1940s flair.

At Blazing Cat Fur, "Zara pulls plug on 'Holocaust shirt' for kids."

The company released a statement, indicating that the tee-shirts, with the "Star of David" on them, will be "exterminated":

The item in question, part of the Cowboy Collection for babies, was inspired by the character of the sheriff in Wild West movies. The word ‘Sheriff’ is visible on the star at the front of the item. Nevertheless, we can understand the sensitive context and connotation that was created. The item does not exist in Israel and as soon as the issue became clear, it was decided the product will be removed from shelves across the world and exterminated.

We sincerely apologize if, as a result, we have offended the feelings of our customers.

Yes, "sincerely." I'm sure.

Zara will destroy all of these shirts: http://t.co/a8ANyLkyYu pic.twitter.com/MoE2KNU46H

— Bloomberg News (@BloombergNews) August 27, 2014

New Jennifer Nicole Lee Photos from Miami Beach

At Egotastic!, "Jennifer Nicole Lee Spotted in South Beach."

Previously Jennifer Nicole Lee blogging here.

Political Correctness Helped Cover Up Child Sexual Exploitation in #Rotherham

More on the enormous depravity in Britain.

At Legal Insurrection, "Racial and religious targeting of white teenage girls — but investigators feared being labeled “racist,” according to independent report."

Also, commentary from Allison Pearson, at Telegraph UK, "Rotherham: In the face of such evil, who is the racist now?"

And at the Other McCain, "The Rotherham Horror."

PREVIOUSLY: "Sex Abuse Ignored in Britain: 1,400 Girls Raped by Muslim Sex-Trafficking Gangs as Police Feared 'Racism' Accusations."

VIDEO: Shirley Sotloff Appeals to Islamic State for the Release of Her Son, Steven Sotloff — #ISIS

An amazing development in the realm of international affairs. A bereaved mother appeals directly to the head of a transnational terrorist organization for the release of her son, held captive as a pawn in the terror war Islamic jihad is waging against the West. The video itself is particularly interesting for its production quality, and its apparent sponsorship by the New York Times. This is some kind of private party diplomacy that is extremely unusual. I'd have to research it, but we'd have to go back to the period of the 1980s, and the kidnappings conducted by the Islamic Jihad Organization in Lebanon, for something similar.

In any case, at the New York Times, "American Hostage’s Mother Issues Appeal to ISIS Leader: Plea to Islamic State for Release of Steven Sotloff" (via Memeorandum):

The mother of an American hostage being held by the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria released an emotional video appeal to his captors on Wednesday. Shirley Sotloff, the mother of the 31-year-old freelance journalist Steven J. Sotloff, addressed her plea directly to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of ISIS and the self-declared caliph of the Muslim world.

Ms. Sotloff addresses Mr. Baghdadi as caliph, a title he bestowed on himself a few months ago, and calls on him to exercise his right to show clemency and follow the example of the Prophet Muhammad as previous caliphs did.

“I am sending this message to you, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi al-Quraishi al-Hussaini, the caliph of the Islamic State. I am Shirley Sotloff. My son Steven is in your hands,” she begins. “You, the caliph, can grant amnesty. I ask you please to release my child,” she continues. “I ask you to use your authority to spare his life.”

Mr. Baghdadi — an Iraqi national who was jailed briefly by American forces in 2004 — declared a caliphate this year after his group captured a significant chunk of territory in Iraq. His claim to authority has not been recognized by most Muslims. In addressing Mr. Baghdadi as caliph of the Muslim world, Ms. Sotloff’s appeal is almost certainly the first time a non-Muslim has acknowledged his authority, a move that may prove controversial.

More.

Miley Cyrus' Homeless Friend Has a Warrant Out for His Arrest

Ms. Cyrus was being touted as a "humanitarian" after Sunday's VMAs.

Now, not so much.

At ABC News:

Jon Stewart Epic 'Race/Off' Rant

Leftists are creaming over this, but what the heck? Stewart's a riot.

Watch: "Race/Off."

'Hero' Josh Shaw Investigation Hangs Over #USC Football

The original story is that he saved his nephew from drowning. Now, maybe not so much.

At LAT, "Josh Shaw situation hangs over preparation for USC season opener."

Will Photo of Kay Hagan Greeting President Obama Doom Her Bid for Second Term?

At USA Today, "Hagan greets Obama: The politics of a photo op in North Carolina."

Photo: Obama and Sens Kay Hagan, Richard Burr in Charlotte, NC via @AP_Images pic.twitter.com/zQrHsMUQYU

— Charles Dharapak (@Dharapak) August 26, 2014

She was bashing Obama just yesterday. It's hard out there for a Democrat.

Sen. Kay Hagan & Obama Tuesday in North Carolina.... http://t.co/KrMEZN9H6H

— CAROLYN ZORN (@zorn17) August 25, 2014

President Obama heads to North Carolina today. And Kay Hagan has to walk a tightrope. http://t.co/m2TQd8WJb7

— Post Politics (@postpolitics) August 26, 2014

Sex Abuse Ignored in Britain: 1,400 Girls Raped by Muslim Sex-Trafficking Gangs as Police Feared 'Racism' Accusations

Look, the Telegraph UK won't even call these guys Muslims, even though they're from Pakistan and all have Arabic-Islamist names.

See, "Rotherham sex abuse scandal: 1,400 children exploited by Asian gangs while authorities turned a blind eye." Also "Video: Police 'sorry' for failure in Rotherham child sex abuse scandal."

But see London's Daily Mail, "Revealed: How fear of being seen as racist stopped social workers saving up to 1,400 children from sexual exploitation at the hands of Asian men in just ONE TOWN."



And especially at Bare Naked Islam, "UK HORRIFIC REVELATIONS: How fear of being called ‘racist’ prevented social workers from rescuing up to 1,400 mostly white girl children from sexual abuse and exploitation by Muslim sex ‘grooming’ gangs in just one town!"

And Iowahawk on Twitter:

BBC says1400 underage girls were raped because officials afraid to describe perps; yet BBC won't describe them either http://t.co/YFtF5RRTvl

— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) August 26, 2014

Guardian also afraid to describe the child rapists who the BBC and government were afraid to describe http://t.co/XevC9tMKLg

— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) August 26, 2014

Keira Knightley for Interview Magazine September 2014

She's lovely.

At Interview, "KEIRA KNIGHTLEY BY PATRICK DEMARCHELIIER."

Joshua Muravchik: Making David into Goliath

Here's another highly recommended book, from Joshua Muravchik, Making David into Goliath: How the World Turned Against Israel.

'Eric Holder Is One of the Biggest Race-Baiters in This Entire Country...'

Andrea Tantaros is da bomb!

Left-Wing Revolt Plunges Hollande Into Crisis

At Telegraph UK:

The French president is forced to order a reshuffle after two dissident cabinet ministers launch an open rebellion against his economic policy.

François Hollande was forced to order his second reshuffle in less than five months today after a revolt within the cabinet threatened to cripple his presidency.

The Left wing of France’s ruling Socialist Party is furious over Mr Hollande’s shift to more centrist economic policies with the introduction of tax and spending cuts aimed at reducing the country’s huge budget deficit.

The outgoing government, headed by the reformist prime minister, Manuel Valls, was appointed in March with the aim of bringing an end to infighting and the cabinet’s apparent lack of direction.

However, it was plunged into crisis over the weekend by Left-wingers led by Arnaud Montebourg, the flamboyant economy minister.

He defied Mr Hollande’s authority by publicly urging him to discard austerity and break with what he described as deficit-cutting measures imposed on the eurozone by “the most extreme orthodoxy of the German Right”.

More.

The Neo-Neocons

Lolz.

Jean Kaufman (Neo-Neocon) oughta get a kick out of that headline, via Bret Stephens, at WSJ, "ISIS Makes Liberals Rediscover the Necessity of Hard Power":

So now liberals want the U.S. to bomb Iraq, and maybe Syria as well, to stop and defeat ISIS, the vilest terror group of all time. Where, one might ask, were these neo-neocons a couple of years ago, when stopping ISIS in its infancy might have spared us the current catastrophe?

Oh, right, they were dining at the table of establishment respectability, drinking from the fountain of opportunistic punditry, hissing at the sound of the names Wolfowitz, Cheney, Libby and Perle.

And, always, rhapsodizing to the music of Barack Obama.

Not because he is the most egregious offender, but only because he's so utterly the type, it's worth turning to the work of George Packer, a writer for the New Yorker. Over the years Mr. Packer has been of this or that mind about Iraq. Yet he has always managed to remain at the dead center of conventional wisdom. Think of him as the bubble, intellectually speaking, in the spirit level of American opinion journalism.

Thus Mr. Packer was for the war when it began in 2003, although "just barely," as he later explained himself. In April 2005 he wrote that the "Iraq war was always winnable" and "still is"—a judgment that would have seemed prescient in the wake of the surge. But by then he had already disavowed his own foresight, saying, when he was in full mea culpa mode, that the line was "the single most doubtful" thing he had written in his acclaimed book "The Assassins' Gate."

Stephens continues to skewer Packer with example after example, and then:

And then along came ISIS.

In the current issue of the New Yorker, Mr. Packer has an essay titled "The Common Enemy," which paints ISIS in especially terrifying colors: The Islamic State's project is "totalitarian." Its ideology is "expansionist as well as eliminationist." It has "many hundreds of fighters holding European or American passports [who] will eventually return home with training, skills, and the arrogance of battlefield victory." It threatened a religious minority with "imminent genocide." Its ambitions will not "remain confined to the boundaries of the Tigris and the Euphrates." The administration's usual counterterrorism tool, the drone strike, is "barely relevant against the Islamic State's thousands of ground troops."

"Pay attention to other people's nightmares," he concludes, "because they might be contagious."

Correcto-mundo. Which brings us back to the questions confronting the Bush administration on Sept. 12, 2001. Are we going to fight terrorists over there—or are we going to wait for them to come here? Do we choose to confront terrorism by means of war—or as a criminal justice issue? Can we assume the cancer in the Middle East won't spread so we can "pivot" to Asia and do some more "nation-building at home"? Can we win with a light-footprint approach against a heavy-footprint enemy?

Say what you will about George W. Bush: He got every one of these questions right while Mr. Obama got every one of them wrong. It's a truth that may at last be dawning on the likes of Mr. Packer and the other neo-neocons, not that I expect them ever to admit it.

Heh. You gotta love it.

The Angry, Disillusioned Music of the London Rapper Accused of Beheading James Foley

From Elias Groll, at Foreign Policy.

The music of the British rapper who reportedly beheaded James Foley is an angry testament to a miserable childhood. http://t.co/S4Xy6qro22

— Foreign Policy (@ForeignPolicy) August 25, 2014

Stop the Race to Judgment on #Ferguson

Deneen Borelli, on Hannity's last week.

And Jason Riley's very thoughtful as well:

'Holocaust Victims,' Relatives Challenge Elie Wiesel for Defending Israel

From Phyllis Chesler, at Big Peace.

A nice piece.

Egypt and United Arab Emirates Launch Airstrikes in Libya

The story's at NYT, "Arab Nations Strike in Libya, Surprising U.S."

And Lt. Col. Ralph Peters, at 7:30 minutes into this Megyn Kelly segment, slams the Obama administration: "Our erstwhile allies don't trust us anymore," because Obama'w letting the entire world go to hell.

Watch:

Black Suspect Arrested After Iraq Vet Beaten by Racial Mob Inflamed by Mike Brown and #Ferguson

"Life in post-racial America," via Instapundit.

At the New Orleans Times-Picayune, "Mississippi man beaten after he's warned restaurant wasn't safe for whites, witness says."

And at USA Today, "Witness: Beaten man told eatery 'not safe for whites'."

Also at Fire Andrea Mitchell, "Courtez McMillian beats West Point Marine Ralph Weems in Michael Brown revenge racist attack."

RT @famblog: Courtez McMillian beats white marine in Michael Brown revenge attack http://t.co/3NqirhEROU #tcot #tgdn pic.twitter.com/zq7GdXxFyD

— ┌П┐(•_•) (@exposeliberals) August 26, 2014

WHITE MARINE VET IN COMA AFTER BEING BEATEN BY BLACK MOB! ~Rebel III% http://t.co/8PcZp21pnM

— Conservative Freaks (@Freak1791) August 25, 2014

Layoffs at CNN? Start by Firing Serial Plagiarist Fareed Zakaria

It's hard out there.

At the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, "Turner Broadcasting to offer voluntary buyouts, layoffs also expected," and "Following layoffs memo, Jeff Zucker tells CNN employees they need to “do less and do it with less”":

CNN chief Jeff Zucker recently shared not so encouraging words with some of the news operation’s employees, many of whom have been bracing for potential jobs cuts.

“We are going to do less and have to do it with less,” Zucker said during a call-in to a news meeting Tuesday morning. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution recently received a partial transcript of the call from a Turner employee who asked not to be identified.

Zucker’s comments feed growing concerns among employees at CNN and other operations of Turner Broadcasting, which has nearly 13,000 full-time employees, about half of them in Atlanta.

Zucker made his comments to staff the day after Turner chief John Martin sent a memo to staff saying a more streamlined company would be in place by the start of next year and that employees would begin hearing more in coming weeks. Turner executives are trying to refocus the business, including shedding costs, spending more on original programming to boost ratings and looking to prioritize other growth options.

Zucker said, “We now have a sense of what Turner is expecting from CNN. I am working with the senior management team at CNN to figure out what this means for us. This will result in changes and what we do and what we stop doing.”

Here’s a transcript of part of Zucker’s call...

More at the link.

CNN can start by firing Fareed Zakaria.

Also at Variety, "Turner Broadcasting Prepares for Staff Buyout Offers Amid Bigger Changes Ahead."

Furious Marine Nick Powers Pens Open Letter to #ISIS

Megyn Kelly just interviewed Nick Powers. I'll update with the clip if becomes available.

Meanwhile, at Independent Journal Review, "Marine Vet’s Viral Post Warning ISIS: ‘Attack Us and There Will be No Mercy’."

'No Angel'

It turns out today's front-page New York Times article on Michael Brown referred to the black thug teenager as "no angel," which is exactly correct. Except that's not politically correct, so out came the knives of the leftist censors to tear into the skin of public editor Margaret Sullivan.

Here's her response to the latest leftist two-minute hate, "An Ill-Chosen Phrase, ‘No Angel,’ Brings a Storm of Protest":

In my view, the timing of the article (on the day of Mr. Brown’s funeral) was not ideal. Its pairing with a profile of Mr. Wilson seemed to inappropriately equate the two people. And “no angel” was a blunder.

In general, though, I found Mr. Eligon’s reporting to be solid and thorough. I came away from the profile with a deeper sense of who Michael Brown was, and an even greater sense of sorrow at the circumstances of his death.

She defends the piece, only to further inflame the black leftist lynch mobs:

So disturbing and unwarranted. The New York Times defends Michael Brown Jr. ‘no angel’ characterization http://t.co/jG2tsSuHP7

— Donna Brazile (@donnabrazile) August 25, 2014

Hope and change!

The Militarization of Policing and What to Do About It

From Glenn Reynolds, at USA Today, "Police problem is unaccountable attitude":

Police officers act like they're in a war zone, forgetting they face citizens, not enemies.

Often, if you wait long enough, an idea comes around. Back in 2006, I wrote a piece for Popular Mechanics on how the federal government's transfer of surplus military equipment to local police departments -- sometimes in very small towns -- was leading to "SWAT overkill."

My complaints didn't get much traction with either the Bush or the Obama administrations. But now, in the wake of what many consider to be an overly militarized police response in Ferguson, Mo., President Obama has ordered a review of federal programs -- in the departments of Defense, Justice and Homeland Security -- to arm local police with military weapons.

Lawmakers -- from Rep. Hank Johnson, D-Ga., and Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., to Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who quoted my 2006 piece in an op-ed in Time Magazine -- are looking at legislation to limit transfers. This is good. There's a role for SWAT teams in limited circumstances, but they've been overused in recent years, deployed for absurd things such as raids on sellers of raw milk. The problem is, when you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail. And when you have cool military equipment, there's a strong temptation to use it, just because, well, it's cool. (Federal regulatory agencies have succumbed to SWAT Fever too.)

I don't entirely blame the police. If somebody gave me a Bradley fighting vehicle, or an Apache helicopter, I'd take it.

But blurring the lines between civilian policing and military action is dangerous...

Continue reading.

Kristin Cavallari Super Tight in Body-Hugging Blue Dress for 'Good Morning America'

Amazing.

At London's Daily Mail, "Kristin Cavallari displays her super trim frame in a skintight blue dress for GMA ...just three months after giving birth."

I'm Reading Caroline Glick: The Israeli Solution

When Glick's new book came out I put in an order at Amazon, but I had the shipping address wrong while updating my account. The Post Office sent the book back.

So, I think it was late July, during the Gaza War (after I watched her congressional briefing), but I went out and bought a copy at the bookstore. Glick is simply the best analyst of Israel's international politics.

Be sure to get your copy if you haven't already. And make sure you've got the correct shipping information for Amazon, heh: The Israeli Solution: A One-State Plan for Peace in the Middle East.

Obama Must Resist #ISIS and Hamas

From Professor Michael Curtis, at American Thinker:

The brutality of ISIS must be ended, and so must Hamas’s aggression against the State of Israel, and the accompanying disease of anti-Semitism.  Palestinians, including people from Fatah and the Palestinian Authority as well as Hamas, are prone to compare actions of Israel with those of the Nazis.  Speeches by their leaders and news reports speak of Israel’s Operation Protective Edge in Gaza as a Holocaust, and of the Israeli Nazi mentality.  This rhetoric provides the excuse for Palestinian violence against Israeli citizens, and for anti-Semitic actions.

American and European leaders are dramatically aware of the horror of ISIS and are preparing to take some further action against its rise. They must now assess the aggressive nature of Hamas and act accordingly. Both ISIS and Hamas must be defeated.

RTWT.

Hamas Solidarity Protester: Hitler Should Have Finished the Jews

Video at Breitbart, "PRO-PALESTINIAN PROTESTER: HITLER SHOULD HAVE FINISHED THE JEWS."

Gangsta! Suge Knight, Hip-Hop Executive, Shot at Pre-VMAs Party in WeHo (VIDEO)

At Fox News, "Rap mogul Suge Knight injured in shooting at pre-VMA party."

And at LAT, "Suge Knight, 2 others shot at Chris Brown party on Sunset Strip," and "Chris Brown party shooting: Another chapter in the life of Suge Knight."

Peter Theo Curtis, Kidnapped American Journalist, Freed in Syria (VIDEO)

Al-Nusra Front released him.

At the Boston Globe, "American man with Mass. ties released in Syria":

An American journalist and author with Boston-area ties has been freed by his Al Qaeda-affiliated captors after nearly two years of imprisonment in Syria.

Peter Theo Curtis, 45, is on his way home after being released by the Syrian Al Qaeda affiliate Jabhat Al-Nusrah and handed over to United Nations forces in an Israeli-occupied village in the Golan Heights, according to statements from the UN, State Department, and family members.

The UN said on its website that Curtis was handed over to UN peacekeepers around 6:40 p.m. local time Sunday. He received a medical check-up, and was then transferred to US government representatives, the statement said.

In a detailed statement released through the State Department, members of Curtis’s family expressed elation and relief.

“We are so relieved that Theo is healthy and safe and that he is finally headed home after his ordeal,” Theo’s mother, Cambridge resident Nancy Curtis, said in the statement. “My heart is full at the extraordinary, dedicated, incredible people, too many to name individually, who have become my friends and have tirelessly helped us over these many months. Please know that we will be eternally grateful.”

Curtis’s family expressed gratitude to the US and Qatari governments for helping to negotiate his release, and said they had been told the negotiations proceeded on a humanitarian basis and did not involve the payment of a ransom. The US, along with the United Kingdom, has a policy barring the payment of ransoms to free its citizens who are being held abroad.

Nancy Curtis said she was “deeply saddened” by the death of James Foley, a New Hampshire journalist whose beheading by a fighter for the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, was depicted in a graphic video released this week.

Nancy Curtis befriended Foley’s mother, Diane Foley, while their two sons were held captive for long stretches by separate groups, she said. She called for the release of others still imprisoned by Islamic militant groups in the Middle East.

ISIS, a radical Islamist group that blossomed in the chaos of Syria’s multi-front civil war, said Foley’s killing was in retaliation for US airstrikes on its fighters in Northern Iraq, where it has captured large swaths of territory in an attempt to establish a conservative caliphate state.

More.

Sunday Cartoons

At Flopping Aces, "Sunday Funnies."



Also at Randy's Roundtable, "Friday Nite Funnies," and Reaganite Republican, "Reaganite's SUNDAY FUNNIES."

CARTOON CREDIT: Legal Insurrection, "Branco Cartoon – Accelerant."

MTV to Shill Leftist #Ferguson Talking Points at Tonight's Video Music Awards — #VMAs

My son's in Inglewood for the VMAs.

He's got great tickets for the pit area, although they've got a blackout on social media for guests: No mobile phone allowed, period. I asked my kid how he was going to handle that and he was just bummed: "That sucks you can't take pictures!" I told him to leave his phone in the van.

In any case, when I see my boy again (hopefully tonight, if he's not out too late), I can deprogram him from all the leftist blather he'll be inundated with.

At the Washington Post, "MTV to turn Video Music Awards spotlight on Ferguson":

Last year, Miley Cyrus’s twerking, teddy-bear-filled performance at MTV’s Video Music Awards set off fierce arguments about race and cultural appropriation. This year, MTV is hoping to use its awards ceremony to start a different kind of conversation. Before and during the show, the network will be airing somber public service announcements about the ongoing standoff between law enforcement and the citizens of Ferguson, Mo., in the wake of the August 9 shooting death of teenager Michael Brown.

MTV’s spots are part of a larger campaign, Look Different, that the network developed in conjunction with organizations including the Anti-Defamation League, the NAACP, the National Council of La Raza and the Southern Poverty Law Center. MTV has a long history of activist-oriented youth programming, and the Look Different program developed out of a paradox that MTV President Stephen Friedman told me he saw showing up in MTV polling.

“Eighty percent of our audience believes that bias is at the root of racism and prejudice,” Friedman said. “But when cultural explosions like Trayvon Martin, or the recent death on Staten Island, or what is now happening in Ferguson occur, our audience often feels paralyzed to discuss the issues.”

The reason? A good-intentioned schema for how to treat other people fairly that ultimately makes it more difficult to acknowledge unfairness or difference when it shows up anyway.

“Ironically, part of the problem is that this generation was taught to be color-blind,” Friedman told me. “As a result, they feel like they’re going to step on a land mine if they say the wrong thing. In fact, our research has shown that fully 70 percent of our white audience grew up not talking about race in their households. They’re striving for fairness and equality and often just aren’t sure how to to proceed.”

And that's a bad thing?

In other words, raising your kids so that race is just a background phenomenon is something to be ashamed of?

Leftists want you think race 24/7. You get Obama constantly talking race ("If I had a son, he'd look like Trayvon"); Holder visiting Ferguson as the chief law-enforcement shakedown artist; and Al Sharpton as the White House point-man for the Democrat-left's perpetual outrage and distortion machine.

And MTV's on the case!

Like I said, I'll be deprogramming my kid later tonight, or tomorrow if I fall asleep before I get the chance.

More at the link, and also, "VMAs 2014 FAQ: Where to watch the show, red carpet details, and who’s performing."

Islamic State, Ferguson, and the Left in Crisis

From Wretchard, at Pajamas Media, "Paradigms Lost" (via Instapundit).

Islamic State Captures Major Air Base in #Syria From Government — UPDATE: Captured Syrian Soldiers Beheaded!

At the Wall Street Journal, "The Base Was the Last Government-Held Outpost in a Province Dominated by Islamic State":

"SashTam Islamic State Captures Major Syrian Air Base From Gov't http://t.co/sH3dYVpjJE #ObamaForeignPolicy #ISIS pic.twitter.com/Hlw3FcjsnU
— Mike Beacham (@Mike_Beacham) August 24, 2014

BEIRUT—The extremist group Islamic State captured a major air base in the northeastern province of Raqqa, driving out regime forces and gaining full control of an entire Syrian province for the first time in the civil war.

Several opposition activists based in the Raqqa area said Islamic State fighters were able to pierce the defenses of the Tabqa air base earlier Sunday and take it over. The capture came after fierce clashes with regime forces for five days at the gates of the military installation located near a town and a dam on the Euphrates River that bear the same name as the Tabqa air base.

It was the latest strategic conquest for the group, which has captured large swaths of territory in Syria and neighboring Iraq. Its recent advances in northern Iraq toward the semiautonomous Kurdish region and threats to religious minorities drew U.S. airstrikes on the militants in Iraq.

The U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition group tracking the conflict through its own network of activists inside Syria, said Islamic State militants captured most of the air base. A contingent of regime forces that had been stationed there withdrew to the town of Athraya to the southwest on a major supply route controlled by the regime, the Observatory said.

The regime's state-controlled news agency SANA described the withdrawal from the air base as a tactical one, an apparent attempt to soften the impact of the loss on regime supporters.

"Our forces have completed a successful regrouping operation after withdrawing from the air base, and they are still carrying out precision strikes against the terrorist groups in the area," said SANA.

The fall of the base to Islamic State fighters gives the group full control of Raqqa province, which shares borders with Turkey to the north and the crucial province of Aleppo to the west. East of Raqqa, the group already controls parts of Hasakah province and more than 80% of Deir-Ezzour province, both bordering Iraq.

Over the past month, Islamic State has succeeded in capturing the headquarters of the Syrian Army's 17th Division in Raqqa and another base for the 93rd Brigade of the same division also located in Raqqa.

The beheading of American journalist James Foley has prompted American officials to begin working to knit together a broader international campaign to combat Islamic State, an effort that the Pentagon warned will require taking the fight beyond Iraq and into Syria.

JWF has the update on Twitter. Click through for the report from McClatchy:

Islamic extremists seize Syrian military base then behead captured Assad soldiers http://t.co/4T4evr1Lhc

— JWF (@JammieWF) August 24, 2014

America: The Ostrich Years

From Derek Hunter, at Town Hall:

In every cartoon I’ve seen with an ostrich, there comes a scene where it gets scared and buries its head in the sand. Ostriches don’t do this in real life, but it came to symbolize, in cartoons at least, the concept of thinking something bad will go away if you simply ignore it. It’s foolish – some would say stupid – but it appears to be the crux of President Barack Obama’s foreign policy.

There are times when a president has to be president, even on vacation. This is the part of the job President Obama seems to hold in contempt – the doing of it. The trappings – the motorcade, Air Force One, hanging out with celebrities, being a celebrity himself, having nearly every whim catered to – are the most appealing part of the job. But it is a job, and he sought it twice. He just doesn’t seem to like doing it.

This isn’t a new development. This president has been checked out to one degree or another since he checked in, but he at least paid lip service to the concept of domestic policy. He didn’t involve himself with the details of many of the laws Democrats in Congress passed; he just gave speeches in support of their concepts and signed them. But when policy issues crossed salt water, he lost all interest.

After a series of groveling speeches trying to make up for his predecessor, who just happens to be more popular than he is now, the president retreated to the comforts of his office and buried his head to the realities of the rest of the world.

Aside from occasional speeches and selfie-filled funerals or summits, Obama turned his gaze domestically and green-ward, to the golf course.

But the funny thing about the rest of the world is it doesn’t go away simply because you wish it would. The troubles of the world have a way of existing regardless whether you pay attention to them.

Afghanistan is on the verge of collapse. Libya is in anarchy. Israel is being attacked hourly by the terrorists in Hamas. Russia is putting its band back together. China is making aggressive moves toward us and Japan. And ISIS is executing people like it’s an Olympic event. Meanwhile, the president has given a few speeches and shaved two strokes off his handicap.

A great piece.

Keep reading.

Sexy Comes in All Sizes

The trend in plus-size fashion, at the San Francisco Chronicle, "Sexy comes in all sizes, says plus-size lingerie boutique owner."

BONUS: Great pic dump photos at Theo Sparks, here and here.

VIDEO: 6.1 Earthquake Hits Napa in Northern California — #NapaQuake

Here's video at the Telegraph UK, "A large earthquake rocked California's northern Bay Area damaging buildings, igniting fires, knocking out power to tens of thousands and sending residents running out of their homes in the darkness."

At at USA Today, "What exactly happened in Napa during earthquake?", and "Napa earthquake: Damaged water mains hurt fire efforts."

And at KRON4 – San Francisco:





More at the KRON YouTube page.

And see iOWNTHEWORLD, "NAPA, CA: NUMEROUS BUILDINGS UNINHABITABLE AFTER EARTHQUAKE."

Douglas Murray Interview with Michael Coren: 'British' Jihadis Abroad

Via Blazing Cat Fur.



And see Murray at the Spectator UK, "Britain’s beheaders – how we came to export jihad."

VIDEO: Race Hustler Al Sharpton Leads Staten Island Protest Over NYPD Chokehold Death of Eric Garner

Funny how Sharpton waited a month to have this protest, making sure to time it with the national race relations debate over Ferguson.

The irony is that in the case of Eric Garner, there's little controversy that the police used excessive force.

At the Wall Street Journal, "Thousands Protest in Staten Island Over Eric Garner's Death: Event, Led by Rev. Al Sharpton, Caps Weeks of New Scrutiny of the NYPD."



PREVIOUSLY: "VIDEO: Staten Island Man Dies After Placed in NYPD Chokehold, Slammed to Ground."

Emily Ratajkowski Cover Shoot for Ocean Drive Magazine

At Ocean Drive, "'Blurred Lines' Model Emily Ratajkowski on Playing Ben Affleck's Mistress in 'Gone Girl'."



HAT TIP: Fox News, "'Blurred Lines' model Emily Ratajkowski: Men need to get over naked women."

Obama's Foreign Policy Meltdown

A scathing piece, from Bret Stephens, at Commentary, "The Meltdown":

In July, after Germany trounced Brazil 7–1 in the semifinal match of the World Cup—including a first-half stretch in which the Brazilian soccer squad gave up an astonishing five goals in 19 minutes—a sports commentator wrote: “This was not a team losing. It was a dream dying.” These words could equally describe what has become of Barack Obama’s foreign policy since his second inauguration. The president, according to the infatuated view of his political aides and media flatterers, was supposed to be playing o jogo bonito, the beautiful game—ending wars, pressing resets, pursuing pivots, and restoring America’s good name abroad.

Instead, he crumbled.

As I write, the foreign policy of the United States is in a state of unprecedented disarray. In some cases, failed policy has given way to an absence of policy. So it is in Libya, Syria, Egypt, Iraq, and, at least until recently, Ukraine. In other cases the president has doubled down on failed policy—extending nuclear negotiations with Iran; announcing the full withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan.

Sometimes the administration has been the victim of events, such as Edward Snowden’s espionage, it made worse through bureaucratic fumbling and feckless administrative fixes. At other times the wounds have been self-inflicted: the espionage scandal in Germany (when it was learned that the United States had continued to spy on our ally despite prior revelations of the NSA’s eavesdropping on Chancellor Angela Merkel); the repeated declaration that “core al-Qaeda” was “on a path to defeat”; the prisoner swap with the Taliban that obtained Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl’s release.

Often the damage has been vivid, as in the collapse of the Israel–Palestinian talks in April followed by the war in Gaza. More frequently it can be heard in the whispered remarks of our allies. “The Polish-American alliance is worthless, even harmful, as it gives Poland a false sense of security,” Radek Sikorski, Poland’s foreign minister and once one of its most reliably pro-American politicians, was overheard saying in June. “It’s bullshit.”

This is far from an exhaustive list. But it’s one that, at last, people have begun to notice. Foreign policy, considered a political strength of the president in his first term, has become a liability. In June, an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll found that Americans disapproved of his handling of foreign affairs by a 57-to-37 percent ratio. Overseas, dismay with Obama mounts. Among Germans, who greeted the future president as a near-messiah when he spoke in Berlin in the summer of 2008, his approval rating fell to 43 percent in late 2013, from 88 percent in 2010. In Egypt, another country the president went out of his way to woo, he has accomplished the unlikely feat of making himself more unpopular than George W. Bush. In Israel, political leaders and commentators from across the political spectrum are united in their disdain for the administration. “The Obama administration proved once again that it is the best friend of its enemies, and the biggest enemy of its friends,” the center-left Haaretz columnist Ari Shavit noted in late July. It’s an observation being echoed by policymakers from Tokyo to Taipei to Tallinn.

But perhaps the most telling indicator is the collapsing confidence in the president among the Democratic-leaning foreign-policy elite in the United States. “Under Obama, the United States has suffered some real reputational damage,” admitted Washington Post columnist David Ignatius in May, adding: “I say this as someone who sympathizes with many of Obama’s foreign-policy goals.” Hillary Clinton, the president’s once loyal secretary of state, offered in early August that “great nations need organizing principles, and ‘don’t do stupid stuff’ is not an organizing principle.” Zbigniew Brzezinski, Jimmy Carter’s national-security adviser, warned in July that “we are losing control of our ability at the highest levels of dealing with challenges that, increasingly, many of us recognize as fundamental to our well-being.” The United States, he added, was “increasingly devoid of strategic will and a sense of direction.”

What's worse is we've still got over two more years of this.

Keep reading.

Nikki Finke Goes Silent in Reported Legal Dispute With Penske Media

I used to read Deadline Hollywood just to find Nikki Finke's dishy inside scoops.

At the New York Times:

The Hollywood journalist Nikki Finke has stopped writing about the movie industry while she and a former employer, Penske Media Corporation, try to reach a legal settlement, according to a person with knowledge of the negotiations.

Ms. Finke built the site Deadline Hollywood into a machine for breaking industry news, and it became among the most influential news sites in the movie business. Penske acquired the site in 2009 and then in 2012 purchased the industry trade magazine Variety, setting off a dispute that caused Ms. Finke to leave the company.

In June of this year, Ms. Finke started her own site, NikkiFinke.com, and resumed reporting on Hollywood in apparent defiance of a noncompete agreement with Penske that barred her from doing so. But Ms. Finke stopped writing on Aug. 11, raising questions about her intentions for the new site.

BuzzFeed reported on Friday that Ms. Finke would shut down the site, but a person with knowledge of the negotiations suggested that it could remain active. Ms. Finke stopped writing about Hollywood, the person said, in order to reach a settlement with Penske that stipulated she could not cover the topic online. (A book she is working on is exempt from the current version of the agreement, as would be any writing in newspapers or magazines.)

She has told friends that she might turn her reporting attentions on NikkiFinke.com to Los Angeles generally, or the media or politics. If she returned to Penske’s media company, she would be allowed to report on movie industry news.

Well, that's like selling your soul to the devil, or something. Doesn't sound like she's going out easily. She may never be able to write about the movie industry online ever again.

'A casual glance at the mountain of distorted and simply false stories reported about Israel and its enemies makes clear that at a minimum, most of the Western media don’t care about the truth...'

From Caroline Glick, "Why Israel is losing the information war":

The goal of hasbara cannot be to educate the likes of The New York Times’ bureau chief Jodi Rudoren about the truth because the problem isn’t one of ignorance. The problem is that they consider the truth an impediment to their goal of reporting the narrative of Israeli criminality.

Rather than striving to educate, we must work to manipulate the Rudorens of the world into covering the truth.

Read it all at that top link.

Stopping the Jihadist Cancer in Iraq and Syria

From Daniel Byman, at the Wall Street Journal, "A Plan to Fight Islamic State":

When President Barack Obama called the Islamic State a "cancer" on Wednesday, the description may have been more apt than he intended. The Sunni jihadist group is indeed a malignant tumor metastasizing in the body of the Middle East. But like cancer, it will be stubbornly difficult to defeat—and some of the cures could end up killing the patient.

The spread has been shockingly quick. In June, the Islamic State surged deeper into Iraq, taking Mosul, Iraq's second-largest city, advancing close to Baghdad and threatening Kurdish territory. The group even declared a "caliphate." Only Mr. Obama's Aug. 7 decision to launch U.S. airstrikes halted its advance.

The Islamic State is stalled militarily but far from beaten. But there is a way to turn the tide...

Continue reading.

VIDEO: Michael Brown Supporter Crashes Pro-Darren Wilson Rally in St. Louis

Via Progressives Today, "SCREAMING MICHAEL BROWN SUPPORTER Crashes Pro-Darren Wilson Rally in St. Louis (VIdeo)."

Parent in Phoenix Says Administrators Made Her Son Wear Pink Fairy Wings on First Day of High School

Because dressing up in queer fairy wings is totally normal, just like two men having disease-ridden sexual intercourse.

If you're not down with that you're a hater!

At the Arizona Republic, "Sunnyslope parent likens orientation to hazing" (via DernDawn):

Monalee Kamlley said her son was nervous to start classes at Sunnyslope High School in Phoenix. She said she spent all summer reassuring him that his first day would be fine.

"The night before, he couldn't even eat he was so nervous, and he couldn't even sleep," Kamlley said.

So when she asked her son how it went after school, he hesitated, then finally mentioned that he had to "walk around in wings" for much of the morning.

Then she saw the costume: pink glittery "fairy" wings and a black furry mustache.

Kamlley said she's upset with the way Sunnyslope treated her son, and she likened the episode to hazing. Her son was embarrassed, she said, and added that the event ruined his first day of high school.

School officials said the costumes are part of the orientation program and weren't meant to embarrass the students. Principal Steve Ducey said they've never had other complaints but called the parent feedback "valuable." However, the school has no plans to get rid of the program, he said.

Whether the incident could be called hazing is murky, said Sabina Low, an assistant research professor at Arizona State University's T. Denny Sanford School of Social and Family Dynamics. Hazing typically is a form of initiation that is intentionally humiliating but often meant as a bonding experience.

"I'm sure they did not set out to make it a humiliating experience for students. So I think calling this hazing is a little bit unclear," Low said. "This one might be a much-watered-down version of that."

More.

British Lingerie Chain Worries Sexy Underwear Named After Egyptian Goddess Might Be Confused with Islamist Barbarians

Well, yeah, you might wanna be more careful before naming your underwear brand "Isis."

At Blazing Cat Fur, "The name ‘Isis’ now unfit for use in polite company: Ann Summers sorry for ‘Isis’ lingerie":

A British lingerie chain store issued an apology on Friday after launching a new line of sexy underwear named after an Egyptian goddess whose name sounds like that of the terrorist group massacring its way through Syria and northern Iraq.

'A 22 year-old U.K. citizen campaigned for women's rights in Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS) in an odd way on Friday: by asking to have equal rights to murder as a terrorist herself...'

Progress on gender equality, at Blazing Cat Fur, "Well Integrated Brit Muslima Demands Equal Beheading Rights for Women."

Governor Rick Perry Mugshot T-Shirts

Spotted by Maeve Reston of the L.A. Times:

.@GovernorPerry Mugshot t-shirts are flying off the shelves in New Hampshire, worn proudly by voters he's courting pic.twitter.com/FacFmF61um

— Maeve Reston (@MaeveReston) August 23, 2014

Noble High School Superintendent Makes 'Skanky' Girls Do Bend-Over Dress Code Check

It's Ronda Bass, the superintendent now being targeted by outraged family members. Of course, these "bend-over ass-checks" should have been performed by the parents, not the school officials.

At KFOR-TV Oklahoma City, "Local superintendent’s controversial way of addressing dress code sends students home humiliated." (Via Memeorandum.)

“If you’re not comfortable with bending over, we might have a problem.”

The Silent Terror: Media Ignoring Islamic Radical’s Murder of Seattle Gay Men?

Robert Stacy McCain reports on Ali Muhammad Brown, who is accused of murdering two gay men in Seattle.

WHAT A HOMOPHOBIC TERRORIST KILLER LOOKS LIKE http://t.co/BiPvf4ZHDO #lgbt #p2 #tcot @maddow @chucktodd pic.twitter.com/CNnFPmNdmL

— Robert Stacy McCain (@rsmccain) August 23, 2014

Also at Pamela Geller's, "Media Ruling: Islam Trumps Gay in America, Islam Trumps Teen Murder in America."

'Call me crazy but if post-op transsexuals have such a brutal suicide rate, maybe we shouldn’t do it to children...'

Gavin McInnes is on an 'indefinite leave of absence' from Rooster following that hilarious piece he wrote a couple of weeks back. I blogged it here, "Wait! You're Transphobic?"

And he's out with some thoughts about it, at Taki Mag, "How to Be Fired."

"If a man isn’t willing to take risk for his opinions, either his opinions are no good or the man is no good."

— Gavin McInnes (@Gavin_McInnes) August 20, 2014

Looking Back at 'Enrique's Journey — The Boy Left Behind'

A fascinating piece at yesterday's Los Angeles Times.

Of course, the subplot is the open-borders advocacy of the Times' correspondents. This is nothing new. What's interesting is that "Enrique's Journey — The Boy Left Behind" ran 12 years ago at the paper, and I still remember it. Reporter Sonia Nazario won the Pulitzer Prize for Feature Writing in 2003 for the series. Photographer Don Bartletti won the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Feature Photography. Enrique's Journey was also published as a book.

So here comes Barletti with a look back, "LOOKING BACK ON A CHILD MIGRANT'S JOURNEY NORTH ON 'THE BEAST'."

"Enrique's Journey" was the trek --- atop the "beast" freight trains of Mexico --- from Honduras to the U.S. Back in 2000, when Barletti was first covering the story, we didn't have the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Action Act, the 2008 anti-trafficking legislation signed into law by President George W. Bush. It's interesting, though, that the more the story changes, the more it stays the same. Illegal immigrants will continue to flow over our southern border until that time when there's no more political gain to be made from it, for both parties, as it turns out. Either that, or enough terrorists slip into the country to conduct a wave of attacks on the homeland so that we finally militarize the border, completing the "fence" everyone dreams about, although by that time the United States will be even more unrecognizable than it is now. When I'm out and about during the day, especially while running routine errands like shopping, or dropping my son off at the mall, I hear languages other than English spoken more often than not. It doesn't bother me. English remains the language of everyday American life --- you're not going to break out of your ethnic enclave, moving into the national mainstream, without it. But then, as more and more of America is increasingly Balkanized, I suspect our underground illegals don't even care. Indeed, I was nearly attacked by a gang of non-English speaking Mexicans when I was working at a gas station in Santa Barbara in 1992. They act like they own the place --- and that was more than 20 years ago. We're long gone now. Probably the best thing we could do would to be to impose a moratorium on immigration for about a decade or so, allowing the massive wave of new immigrants to assimilate into the country. Democrats don't care about that, of course. They know that they're creating a Democrat Party dependency class with all the undocumented criminals and diseased walking-zombies. Strange, frankly. Democrats don't care about the security of the lives of regular Americans. President Obama epitomizes the base corruption that is the core of the Democrat Party-left. And "Enrique's Journey" is the kind of "good" journalism that wins all kinds of awards for glorifying the criminal activity of illegal aliens who make a mockery of the notion of America as a nation of laws. This is what we've come to as a nation.

Let's just hope there's a decent America left by the time our children have families. There's always hope.

[Speaking of hope, Barletti's subject is Denis Contreras, the boy he'd interviewed in 2000 for the original story. It turns out that Denis was deported from San Diego this year after living nearly 14 years in the U.S. He left behind a wife and child in the states. Illegal immigrant family values, I guess. Maybe they thought the Obama-Dems would be handing out "permisos." Not this time though. Bummer for the dude.]

'Fiberhoods' — Google Provides Neighborhoods With Faster and Cheaper Internet Service, but Are Some Being Left Behind?

Here's more on the power of contemporary social media companies.

At the Wall Street Journal, "Google Fiber Is Fast, but Is It Fair?":

Frustrated by the hammerlock of U.S. broadband providers, Google Inc. GOOGL +0.02% has searched for ways around them to provide faster Internet speeds at lower cost, via everything from high-speed fiber to satellites.

In the process, it is changing how next-generation broadband is rolled out.

Telecom and cable companies generally have been required to blanket entire cities, offering connections to every home. By contrast, Google is building high-speed services as it finds demand, laying new fiber neighborhood by neighborhood.

Others including AT&T Inc. T -0.40%  and CenturyLink Inc. CTL -0.27%  are copying Google's approach, underscoring a deeper shift in U.S. telecommunications policy, from requiring universal service to letting the marketplace decide.

As Google's model gathers momentum, it stirs up questions about whether residents of poor or underserved neighborhoods will be left behind.

U.S. policy long favored extending service to all. AT&T touted its "universal service" in advertisements more than a century ago. The concept was codified in a 1934 law requiring nationwide "wire and radio services" to reach everyone at "reasonable charges."

In exchange for wiring a community, telecommunications providers often gained a monopoly. Cities made similar deals with cable-TV providers beginning in the 1960s.

The emergence of the commercial Internet in 1990s led to a reassessment. Policy swung in favor of encouraging competition in the hope that it would bring more people online faster. Over time, Congress and regulators loosened the strings on Internet providers.

Google seized the opening in 2010, as it sought to stoke demand for bandwidth-hungry businesses, such as its YouTube online-video site. It solicited interest from cities for a new network, specifying that it sought "opportunities to experiment with deployment techniques." More than 1,000 municipalities responded.

In 2011, Google struck a deal with authorities in both Kansas City, Kan., and Kansas City, Mo., to build the service based on customer demand. City officials say they didn't push hard for universal coverage because they thought faster Internet service would boost the local economy and they were competing against so many other cities.

"The main point was to win and bring that infrastructure to our city," said Rick Usher, assistant city manager of Kansas City, Mo.

As phone and cable companies slowed their own expansion plans, more cities allowed the selective approach.

Mary Beth Henry, director of community technology in Portland, Ore., says broadband providers balked at covering the entire city. So Portland stopped requiring universal coverage in 2007 and this year signed a deal with Google that employs the build-to-demand approach.

Offering service everywhere is "too risky and returns are lower," she said.

In Kansas City, Google divided the region into areas of a few hundred homes it called "fiberhoods" and asked residents to pay $10 to preregister for a service that would operate at one gigabit per second, about 100 times the U.S. average. The service now costs $70 a month.

If interest exceeded a certain threshold, generally between 5% and 25% of households, Google connected the area. The threshold varied based on population density. Google also worked with local officials to speed the permitting and construction process. It skipped some areas entirely, because they were too thinly populated or because of construction challenges, a company spokeswoman said.

To date, Google has conducted preregistration in 364 neighborhoods; all but 16 hit Google's threshold for connection. Google hasn't disclosed how many homes in each neighborhood subscribe to its service...

More.

After Foley Beheading, U.S. Refocuses on Islamic State Threat to the Homeland

From last night's CBS News This Evening, with Bob Schieffer:

Jessica Alba's Smokin' 'Sin City' Character is the 'Opposite of Who I Am'

Hmm, the original "Sin City" was released in 2005, when Ms. Alba would have been just 24 years-old. She's looking no worse for the wear in the sequel, "Sin City: A Dame to Kill For."

An interview with Juju Chang for Nightline:



The movie's in theaters now. Here's a trailer: "Frank Miller's Sin City: A Dame To Kill For - 60 Second Trailer - The Weinstein Company."

And Betsy Sharkey's review, at the Los Angeles Times, "'Sin City: A Dame to Kill For' is a sinful waste of a sequel."

NBC's Richard Engel: U.S. Policy Against Islamic State 'Isn't Working'

From last last night's ‎Hardball with Chris Matthews:

Russia Using Artillery in #Ukraine, NATO Says

At the Wall Street Journal, "Ukraine Says Russia Violated Its Border: Move Comes as NATO Says Russia Has Been Using Artillery Against Ukraine":

Russia has been using artillery against Ukraine forces both from its own territory and from inside Ukraine, NATO officials said Friday. It was the latest volatile development as U.S. and Western military leaders condemned Moscow for sending a convoy of trucks believed to be carrying humanitarian aid into Ukraine without Kiev's permission.

The entry of the aid convoy and the reported presence of Russian forces mark a sharp escalation of the four-month-old conflict. The developments also risk derailing a new diplomatic push to calm the conflict, with German Chancellor Angela Merkel scheduled to visit Kiev on Saturday and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko due to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin and European Union officials on Tuesday.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization warned of a "dangerous situation" as reports of increased covert Russian military involvement, including artillery fire, within Ukraine coincided with the entry of the convoy, which gives Russia an overt official presence in rebel-held territory for the first time. U.S. officials said Russia's actions could trigger further consequences, without elaborating.

Russia, which has steadfastly denied aiding the pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine, brushed aside NATO's accusations. "They have been reporting those things throughout the crisis without providing any proof," Vitaly Churkin, Russia's ambassador to the United Nations, told reporters in New York.

Oana Lungescu, spokeswoman for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, said Friday, "Since mid-August we have multiple reports of the direct involvement of Russian forces, including Russian airborne, air-defense and special-operations forces, in eastern Ukraine." Russian artillery had been fired against Ukrainian forces "both cross-border and from within Ukraine," Ms. Lungescu said. She didn't say how many Russian troops are believed to be in eastern Ukraine or where they had been active.

U.S. officials also said that Russia had been firing into Ukraine, but stopped short of confirming that the artillery fire had come from within Ukraine.

"We have seen the use of Russian artillery in Ukraine in the past days," Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes said. "I wouldn't want to speak to an individual instance today, but it certainly has been a pattern whereby we've seen firing from within Russia into Ukraine, and we've seen a disturbing movement of Russian artillery and military equipment into Ukraine as well."

Well, obviously we're not going to do anything. Russian's been acting with impunity for months, if not years.

More.

And watch the first half of this Martha McCallum interview with Lieutenant General Thomas McInerney, who slams Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes as basically an impotent weasel. This is a "covert invasion" of Ukraine by Russia, says McInery. A very serious development not likely to be rebuffed anytime soon. Watch: "Russia Convoy Crosses Into Ukraine - The Kelly File."

Death of James Foley Demands We Bear Witness, Not Craven Self-Censorship

This has been my position all along, and it irks me that the leftist push for censorship of terror has become the reflex mode for so many.

Jeff Jacoby pushes back against the cowardly leftist culture of ostrich-like self-censorship, at the Boston Globe, "James Foley video is grim, but we owe it to him to bear witness":

James Foley wasn't in Syria to sanitize ISIS's evil, but to expose it. The evidence of his death deserves no less. http://t.co/uaK3OhEHRK

— Jeff Jacoby (@Jeff_Jacoby) August 22, 2014

SCARCELY HAD ISIS posted its video showing the grisly beheading of American journalist James Foley than the rush to stifle it began.

“Don’t watch the video. Don’t share it. That’s not how life should be,” entreated Foley’s sister Kelly in a message on Twitter that was heavily retweeted. Thousands of social media users, some of them journalists, called for an #ISISMediaBlackout — the hashtag quickly went viral — and Twitter CEO Dick Costolo announced that the company was “actively suspending accounts as we discover them related to this graphic imagery.” YouTube removed versions of the video posted on its site, invoking its policy on “gratuitous violence, hate speech, and incitement to commit violent acts.”

Most mainstream news organizations chose not to show or link to the sickening videos, or to publish still photos showing Foley being beheaded. One exception was the New York Post, which ran a front-page picture showing the journalist just as the knife was put to his throat, with the one-word headline: “SAVAGES.” For doing so, the paper was vehementlycriticized. Buzzfeed editor Adam Serwer echoed the widespread view that to publicize the gruesome image was to give the terrorists more of the notoriety they crave. “Pretty sure ISIS could not be happier with the New York Post’s front page today,” he tweeted.

Would that have been Foley’s reaction? Would he have clamored for self-censorship and a media blackout? Or would he have wanted decent people everywhere to know — and, yes, to see — the crimes being committed by the ruthlessly indecent killers calling themselves the Islamic State?

The intrepid and compassionate reporter from New Hampshire didn’t travel to Syria to sanitize and downplay the horror occurring there. He went to document and expose it. The 4-minute, 40-second video that records the last moments of Foley’s life may be slick jihadist propaganda designed to intimidate ISIS’s enemies and recruit more zealots to its cause. But it is also a key piece of the news story that Foley risked everything to pursue. That story cost him his life. The least we can do is bear witness to the courage and dignity with which he met his awful end.

Anyone with a heart understands why Foley’s anguished loved ones would want his murderers’ gloating depravity to be suppressed. When The Wall Street Journal’s Daniel Pearl was beheaded by Al Qaeda in 2002, his family issued a similar plea. “We should remove all terrorist-produced murder scenes from our Web sites and agree to suppress such scenes in the future,” urged Daniel’s father, the scientist Judea Pearl, in a published essay.

But we will never prevail over an enemy as barbaric and totalitarian as the Islamic State if we avert our gaze from what it does to those it vanquishes. There are times when it is necessary to see the evil, not just to read or hear about it. Images, especially of man’s inhumanity to man, can often convey truths and illuminate reality with an urgency that the best-chosen words cannot match...

More.

In the Mail: William Voegeli, 'The Pity Party: A Mean-Spirited Diatribe Against Liberal Compassion'

I like this book. So far I've read the introduction, but I'm not putting it down.

The publisher sent me an uncorrected proof. The book releases to the general public in November. Pre-order just in time for the holidays: The Pity Party: A Mean-Spirited Diatribe Against Liberal Compassion.