Donald Trump Promises New Attacks on Hillary Clinton as GOP Race Ends (VIDEO)

The the full speech from last night at the clip.

And at the Wall Street Journal:

BRIARCLIFF MANOR, N.Y. – Donald Trump, sidestepping the firestorm that has engulfed his campaign in recent days, marked the end of the GOP primary season Tuesday by escalating his attacks on Hillary Clinton, raising questions about her ethics and promising to give a “major speech” as early as Monday to discuss “all of the things that have taken place” with the presumptive Democratic nominee.

“The Clintons have turned the politics of personal enrichment into an art form form themselves,” Mr. Trump said speaking to supporters as the polls closed in New Jersey, one of five states voting Tuesday.

He made no mention of the controversies that have been roiling his own party for the last two weeks over his criticism of a federal judge handling litigation against Trump University.

Hoping to quiet the firestorm that has pitted Mr. Trump against most elected officials in the GOP, he had earlier in the day issued a statement saying he had been “misconstrued” by critics who said he was racist because he accused U.S. Judge Gonzalo Curiel of being biased against him because he is of Mexican descent. Mr. Trump did not apologize or recant his attacks despite wide criticism from allies and adversaries alike, but he said he would not discuss the case any more.

He stuck to that intention at the Tuesday evening appearance at his golf course in the suburbs of New York, as he prepared to celebrate primary victories in New Jersey, South Dakota, Montana, New Mexico, and California on the last day of the long, unpredictable primary season.

He took no questions from reporters; his speech was short, focused on Mrs. Clinton and uncharacteristically scripted for a man famous for his off-the-cuff performances. He read the speech from a teleprompter, less than a week after deriding Mrs. Clinton for using the device to present a major speech of her own attacking Mr. Trump as ill-suited for the Oval Office.

For a man struggling to unify his party after a long, divisive primary season, he chose one of the most powerful tools available for galvanizing Republicans: attacking Mrs. Clinton just as she was at last ending her own primary battle against Sen. Bernie Sanders...

Good for him.

Keep reading.

Sports Illustrated Summer of Swimsuit (2016)

Here's an eye-opener for all of you late-risers, lol.

Here's Today's Jackie Johnson Weather Forecast

I missed getting to this last night because of the election.

In fact, I didn't even blog. I just watched the returns on Twitter and TV, heh.

At CBS News 2 Los Angeles:

Hillary Clinton Shifts to Far-Left as She Claims Party's Nomination

This is interesting.

Back in the 1990s, the Clintons claimed to be centrist "New Democrats" opportunistically, so they could win. Inside there's always been an Alinskyite Marxist collectivist waiting to break out.

At the Wall Street Journal, "How Hillary Clinton Shifted Leftward":

When she stood before New York Democrats and launched her first campaign for office 16 years ago, Hillary Clinton was unabashed about her centrist credentials.

“I’m a New Democrat,” the first lady said in announcing her Senate bid. Her husband worked for a decade to move the party away from its liberal roots and win over independent voters. Now Mrs. Clinton touted that third-way philosophy, too.

“I don’t believe government is the source of all our problems, or the solution to them,” she said.

Today, a transformed Mrs. Clinton campaigns again, this time for president. On a swath of domestic issues, dragged along by a rapidly changing party and a surprisingly tough primary opponent in Sen. Bernie Sanders, Mrs. Clinton has moved to the left, sometimes reversing her positions and in other cases changing her tone in significant ways.

Mrs. Clinton has undone her longtime opposition to gay marriage. She apologized for her 2002 vote authorizing an invasion of Iraq. She backed off support for charter schools. She called for an end to the “era of mass incarceration,” a rebuke of her husband’s 1994 crime bill.

Under intense pressure from Mr. Sanders, she came out against the Keystone XL pipeline, a project that as secretary of state she said she was inclined to approve. She opposed the Trans-Pacific Partnership, an Asian free-trade agreement she had predicted would be the “gold standard,” but that was opposed by labor unions, most Democrats and Mr. Sanders.

And on Social Security, Mrs. Clinton all but abandoned her longtime interest in a bipartisan compromise aimed at extending the program’s solvency and adopted liberal promises not to cut benefits.

On Tuesday, eight years after Mrs. Clinton conceded the 2008 contest, she celebrated victory in her quest for her party’s presidential nomination, a historic achievement making her the first woman to run on a major party ticket. Primary voters cast ballots on Tuesday in California and five other states. Mrs. Clinton went over the top a day earlier with commitments from party leaders who are convention delegates, according to an Associated Press tally.

Now Mrs. Clinton is set to face Republican Donald Trump this fall, and being seen as more liberal may not help in wooing crucial independents and working-class voters. Further, her changing views may feed a perception among some voters that she is untrustworthy, as it did among many Sanders supporters.

“I don’t feel she’s genuine, to be honest,” said Bill Losch, 63 years old, of Las Vegas, a Sanders delegate. “She’ll do whatever she needs to do to be elected.”

Democrats in and out of Mrs. Clinton’s campaign say her shifting positions reflect new facts and show her willingness to adapt while sticking to core principles...

More.

Clinton Romesha, Red Platoon

This looks excellent.

At Amazon, Clinton Romesha, Red Platoon: A True Story of American Valor.

“A vitally important story that needs to be understood by the public, and I cannot imagine an account that does it better justice that Romesha’s.” —Sebastian Junger, journalist and author of The Perfect Storm

“Red Platoon is sure to become a classic of the genre.”—Hampton Sides, author of Ghost Soldiers and In the Kingdom of Ice

The only comprehensive, firsthand account of the fourteen hour firefight at the Battle of Keating by Medal of Honor recipient Clinton Romesha, for readers of Black Hawk Down by Mark Bowden and Lone Survivor by Marcus Luttrell.

“‘It doesn’t get better.’ To us, that phrase nailed one of the essential truths, maybe even the essential truth, about being stuck at an outpost whose strategic and tactical vulnerabilities were so glaringly obvious to every soldier who had ever set foot in that place that the name itself—Keating—had become a kind of backhanded joke.”

In 2009, Clinton Romesha of Red Platoon and the rest of the Black Knight Troop were preparing to shut down Command Outpost (COP) Keating, the most remote and inaccessible in a string of bases built by the U.S. military in Nuristan and Kunar in the hope of preventing Taliban insurgents from moving freely back and forth between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Three years after its construction, the army was finally ready to concede what the men on the ground had known immediately: it was simply too isolated and too dangerous to defend.

On October 3, 2009, after years of constant smaller attacks, the Taliban finally decided to throw everything they had at Keating. The ensuing 14-hour battle—and eventual victory—cost 8 men their lives.

Red Platoon is the riveting first-hand account of the Battle of Keating, told by Romesha, who spearheaded both the defense of the outpost and the counter-attack that drove the Taliban back beyond the wire, and received the Medal of Honor for his actions.

Shop here.

And thanks so much!

Bernie Sanders Leads Among Eligible Voters in California

Today's election day, finally.

Here's Cathleen Decker, at the Los Angeles Times, "Analysis: Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton in a tight race in California as the campaign batters her popularity":

Bernie Sanders is favored the most among eligible voters in California, our poll shows https://t.co/6QPSOuypbP pic.twitter.com/AJOYLPyOpC

— Los Angeles Times (@latimes) June 5, 2016

New USC/LATimes poll finds a battered Hillary Clinton and ascendant Bernie Sanders in a tight race in California https://t.co/ZtmgPAiCYE

— Cathleen Decker (@cathleendecker) June 2, 2016

Hillary Clinton’s popularity has slumped in California under an unrelenting challenge from Bernie Sanders, who has succeeded in breaching the demographic wall Clinton had counted on to protect her in the state’s presidential primary, a new USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll has found.

As he has done across the country this primary season, Sanders commands the support of younger voters by huge margins in advance of Tuesday’s primary — even among Latinos and Asians, voter groups that Clinton easily won when she ran eight years ago. Many of his backers come from a large pool of voters who have registered for the first time in the weeks before the election.

Yet, Tuesday’s outcome remains difficult to predict, precisely because of the untested nature of Sanders’ following. That portends an intense fight in the final days of the campaign.

The Vermont senator has battled Clinton to a draw among all voters eligible for the Democratic primary, with 44% siding with him to 43% for Clinton. That represented a nine-point swing from a USC/Los Angeles Times poll in March, in which Clinton led handily.

But among those most likely to vote, based on their voting history and stated intentions this time around, Clinton led, 49%-39%, in the new poll. Her standing is bolstered by the reliability of her older supporters, who have a proven record of casting ballots.

She also leads convincingly among registered Democrats; 53% of likely Democratic voters supported her, to 37% for Sanders. Throughout the year, she has carried party members in every state but Sanders’ home state of Vermont and next-door New Hampshire, where he won in a landslide.

As he has elsewhere, Sanders benefits here from party rules that allow registered nonpartisan voters — known in California as “no party preference” voters — to take part in the Democratic primary. Among nonpartisans who were likely to vote, he led by 48%-35%.

Sanders’ chances of victory rest on big turnout of voters who typically don’t vote in primaries and who — in the case of the nonpartisans — will have to navigate complicated voter rules to request a Democratic ballot.

“His base of support is young voters, low-propensity voters and [nonpartisan] voters. Not only does he have to turn them out by election day, but he has to educate all those nonpartisan voters” to request a Democratic ballot, said Dan Schnur, the poll director who heads USC’s Jesse M. Unruh Institute of Politics.

“That’s not to say he can’t pull it off, but this may be the biggest voter mobilization challenge California has seen in many, many years.”

For all the threat the primary represents, Clinton, who likely will clinch the Democratic nomination even before Californians’ votes are counted, retains most of her strength in a general election contest against presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump.

Trump has contended in recent days that he could make a run at California in November, but the poll showed that to be implausible, at best...

More.

And ICYMI, "Hillary Clinton Rallies Supporters at Long Beach City College (VIDEO)."

Quoted in LBCC's Viking Newspaper

Following-up from last night, "Hillary Clinton Rallies Supporters at Long Beach City College (VIDEO)."

The college newspaper contacted me for some comments on Clinton's visit. My colleague Charlotte Joseph was contacted as well.

Here's the piece, "Political-Science Professors React to Hillary Clinton Rally":

Professor Charlotte Joseph said in an email Sunday, June 5, she considers herself a “swing voter” and is supporting Clinton due to her vast experience in foreign and domestic policy. She said, “It is a fantastic opportunity whenever any candidate comes to our campus.  It allows our students and the entire college community a chance to hear challenging ideas and to evaluate how these fit with their own beliefs.”

Joseph said, “It provides an educational opportunity that most people never get the chance to see.  Most of us get our information from the television or the internet, in sound bites. We rarely have the opportunity to hear a speech from beginning to end. Hopefully, this will be the first of many such events at LBCC because of the uniqueness of our college and student body.”

Although he is registered to vote in the Republican primary, Professor Douglas said in an email Monday, June 6, just hours before Clinton’s speech that he doesn’t identify as Republican or Democrat.

Douglas said, “The 2016 election has generated tremendous excitement, more than usual, in my experience, especially in California, where our primary is expected to be decisive. So, it’s great that students can participate directly in the political process by attending a campaign rally. The event brings the campaign home to those who’re already interested and makes it a personal, potentially life-changing experience to see and hear their candidate close up.”

Douglas also said he expects Clinton to receive a lot of media coverage and believes if Clinton were to lose in California, then the Bernie Sanders campaign would receive “enormous momentum and could put pressure on the Democrat National Committee to weaken the rules of the party’s super delegates.”

Why Millennials Are Least Likely to Vote

Millennials have a lot of latent political power, but they're the slacker generation. I doubt they'll overtake older Americans in participation any time soon.

At the O.C. Register, "Why millennials, now totaling 69.2 million, are least likely to vote."

Why millennials, now totaling 69.2 million, are least likely to vote https://t.co/va0Ohx1WgB #CAPrimary

— O.C. Register (@ocregister) June 7, 2016

Bill Whittle's Firewall: Transgender Bathrooms and the Progressive Synthetic Injustice Machine

Here's the inimitable Bill Whittle, "The Bathroom Wars":

Jackie Johnson's Cooler Marine Layer Forecast

Thank goodness for the mild weather. Folks were waiting for hours in line yesterday for the Hillary Clinton rally. It wasn't too bad after all.

Here's Ms. Jackie, for CBS News 2 Los Angeles:

Hillary Clinton Rallies Supporters at Long Beach City College (VIDEO)

The college just announced the Clinton visit on Friday, which was relatively short notice.

I wasn't all that thrilled about it, especially since the original announcement said that doors were open at 2:00pm (for a 4:00pm event), and that was going to cut into class time.

It turns out the timeline was pushed back two hours, with doors scheduled to open at 4:00pm (for a 6:00pm event). That wasn't too bad. My 12:45pm American politics class saw pretty much regular attendance. My 2:20pm international relations class was less than half attended, but no matter. I had a brief presentation planned anyway, and I distributed a handout last week, in any case.

Students elsewhere around campus were complaining, though. It was a big event that caused some distractions for students not interested in the campaign. They just wanted to study.

I don't see a report on the rally anywhere. Everyone's talking about the AP story announcing the Clinton's got the delegates to clinch the nomination.

I'll update with more later.

Meanwhile, some video and tweets:

Ginormous line to get into @HillaryClinton rally at #LBCC crossing fingers I make it #thisiswhatdemocracylookslike 👍 pic.twitter.com/5qJnXPNyKH

— MichelleRobbins (@MichelleRobbins) June 6, 2016

Bernie Sanders supporters outside #HillaryClinton rally in #longbeach pic.twitter.com/MJ0eWWbFQ0

— Stephanie Rivera (@Steph_LBPost) June 7, 2016

First public sighting of Hillary since AP called the nomination for her. pic.twitter.com/JsBt4fXNL0

— Seema Mehta (@LATSeema) June 7, 2016

.@Hadas_Gold #HillaryClinton speaking at #LBCC. cc. @maggieNYT @Instapundit @Not_RSMcCain #CAPrimary #CA pic.twitter.com/3q7VrnDW0O

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) June 7, 2016

"We are on the brink of a historic unprecedented moment but we still have work to do don't we? We have 6 elections tomorrow"-@hillaryclinton

— Cathleen Decker (@cathleendecker) June 7, 2016

"I have a special place in my heart for Long Beach...I want to be a good partner"--words perhaps never spoken before by a newly-minted nom

— Cathleen Decker (@cathleendecker) June 7, 2016

"I'm a progressive who wants to get things done"--does that mark the end of "stronger together" or just a visit to the slogan vault?

— Cathleen Decker (@cathleendecker) June 7, 2016

@cathleendecker No. She said "stronger together" too.

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) June 7, 2016

After the tweet! :) https://t.co/zkBpbaIian

— Cathleen Decker (@cathleendecker) June 7, 2016

Young Blacks Aren't Enamored of Hillary Clinton

Here's the age divide among black voters, at LAT, "Among some black voters, a generational divide on Clinton vs. Sanders":

The president of the New Frontier Democratic Club made his hard pitch for voting for Hillary Clinton inside the South Los Angeles community room.

She will lead the charge for racial equality and fair pay for women, Mike Davis told the two dozen black men and women last month. She will fight for black families, he said, stretching his hosannas for the former secretary of state for a good 10 minutes.

Can we just take a vote to endorse Hillary, someone in the crowd said. “Let’s vote,” Davis agreed.

James Scriven Sr., 79, raised his hand high along with everybody except for two holdouts: Scriven’s two sons, Tabari, 39, and James Jr., 41.

To their father’s mild displeasure, they were feeling the Bern.

 “He has new ideas that will help the economy and create jobs,” Tabari, of Inglewood, said of Bernie Sanders. “Young people are trying to better themselves through education, but student loans are standing in the way.”

With the California primary set for Tuesday, polls suggest the race between Clinton and Sanders has tightened, although she still appears to hold a lead.

A poll of black voters in California commissioned by the African American Voter Registration Education Participation Project conducted by Evitarus found that 71% of 800 likely voters surveyed supported Clinton. But among the black voters younger than 40, half said they would probably vote for Sanders, compared with 34% for Clinton. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

His sons’ support for Sanders did not sit well with the elder Scriven, who like many blacks has an enduring affection for Clinton’s husband.

“Bernie is not going to win,” Scriven said dismissively. “They will be voting for Hillary Clinton in the presidential election.”

Despite her overall lead with blacks, Clinton did not neatly inherit the love many felt for Bill Clinton, who famously played a soulful saxophone on “The Arsenio Hall Show” in 1992 and whom novelist Toni Morrison later dubbed “the first black president.”

If significant numbers of younger African Americans vote for Sanders, that could play an important role in a primary that Dan Schnur, director of the Jesse M. Unruh Institute of Politics at USC, said could be tight.

“There is no question that Sanders can win the California primary,” Schnur said. To do so, however, he would need an unusually large turnout of young voters,  including young minority voters like the Scriven brothers.

Keep reading.

John C. McManus on D-Day

His top five D-Day books, at WSJ, "FIVE BEST: John C. McManus.

Mentioned there, Jonathan Gawne, Spearheading D-Day: American Special Units in Normandy.

McManus's book is here, The Dead and Those About to Die: D-Day: The Big Red One at Omaha Beach.

Plus, Cornelius Ryan, The Longest Day: The Classic Epic of D-Day.

And thanks for shopping through my Amazon helps. It helps me afford my own reading obsession!

BONUS: At WSJ, from Stacy Meichtry and Marion Halftermeyer, "Last of Surviving D-Day Veterans Battle Time to Bear Witness."

Remembering D-Day: Then and Now

From Christopher Kelly, at RealClearHistory:

Photographer Robert Sargent, in landing craft on Omaha beach, captures US 1st Infantry Division wading into gunfire pic.twitter.com/y0VeTeiGQo

— WW2 Tweets from 1944 (@RealTimeWWII) June 6, 2016

Seventy-two years ago, on June 6, 1944, Allied troops waded ashore on the beaches of Normandy to liberate Nazi-occupied Europe. The night before, on June 5, American airborne forces had landed on the western flank of the invasion area near Sainte-Mère-Église, while British airborne forces secured the eastern flank and Pegasus Bridge. They jumped out of C-47 Dakota transport planes, through darkness and into glory. Some arrived by glider. Private John Steele of the 82nd Airborne landed on the steeple of the church at Sainte-Mère-Église. He managed to survive by playing dead.

Today a visitor to Sainte-Mère-Église can observe a mannequin representing Steele hanging from the church tower. Inside the church is a stained glass window of the Virgin Mary surrounded by American paratroopers.

On Utah Beach—all of the landing sites had code names—56-year-old Brig. Gen. Theodore Roosevelt Jr. (the oldest son of former president Teddy Roosevelt) landed about a mile away from his intended target. When asked whether to re-embark the 4th Infantry Division, he simply said, “We’ll start the war from right here!” Prior to the landing, Omaha Beach, also known as Bloody Omaha, had received an abbreviated naval bombardment from ships such as the battleship Texas lasting only 35 minutes. The bare stretches of beach offered no cover for the American invaders as German machine guns from fortified gun emplacements swept the beaches.

The U.S. Rangers, who had trained earlier on the cliffs of Dorset, scaled the sheer cliffs of Pointe Du Hoc while being shot at by German soldiers. Their mission was to destroy artillery pieces targeted on the landing zones. Their commander was Lt. Col. James Rudder. Unknown to Rudder’s Rangers, most of the artillery had already been moved by the Germans. They held their position for two days in the face of fierce counterattacks by the Germans' 916th Grenadiers. At the Ranger memorial at Pointe du Hoc, one can still see massive craters created by the Allied naval bombardment.

The Canadians stormed ashore on Juno Beach. James Doohan, who later played Scotty on Star Trek, was among the Canadian soldiers that day. Sword and Gold beaches were reserved for the British forces. A small contingent of French commandos joined the British on Sword and helped capture Ouistreham, destroying the casino there. One French officer who had previously lost at the tables was not sorry to see the casino in ruins that day.

With the D-Day landing, the Allies, in spite of the vast size of their armada and the relative openness of their societies, achieved a remarkable strategic surprise over the Germans. On June 6, Rommel was in Germany celebrating his wife's 50th birthday. Hitler was persisting in the mistaken belief that the Normandy invasion was a feint and that the real blow would be struck at Pas de Calais...

Keep reading.

Bernie Sanders Campaign Divided Over Next Step

Democratic pollster Doug Schoen had a great piece at the Wall Street Journal the other day, "Clinton Might Not Be the Nominee."

The scenario he lays out rests on Bernie winning California on Tuesday, which would give the Vermont socialist tremendous momentum heading into the Democrats' July convention in Philadelphia.

But Tuesday's Democrat primary's too close to call, and personally I'd be surprised if Bernie wins (although that would be great).

But we'll see. We'll see.

Meanwhile, here's WSJ, "Bernie Sanders Campaign Is Split Over Whether to Fight on Past Tuesday":

A split is emerging inside the Bernie Sanders campaign over whether the senator should stand down after Tuesday’s election contests and unite behind Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton, or take the fight all the way to the July party convention and try to pry the nomination from her.

One camp might be dubbed the Sandersistas, the loyalists who helped guide Mr. Sanders’s political ascent in Vermont and the U.S. Congress and are loath to give up a fight that has far surpassed expectations. Another has ties not only to Mr. Sanders but to the broader interests of a Democratic Party pining to beat back the challenge from Republican Donald Trump and make gains in congressional elections.

Mr. Sanders in recent weeks has made clear he aims to take his candidacy past the elections on Tuesday, when California, New Jersey and four other states vote. But the debate within the campaign indicates that Mr. Sanders’s next move isn’t settled.

For now, Democratic officials, fund-raisers and operatives are getting impatient, calling on Mr. Sanders to quit the race and begin the work of unifying the party for the showdown with the Republican presumptive nominee.

Orin Kramer, a New York hedge-fund manager who has raised campaign funds for both President Barack Obama and Mrs. Clinton, said with respect to Mr. Sanders’s future plans: “I would hope people would understand what a Trump presidency would mean and act accordingly—and ‘accordingly’ means quickly.”

A strong showing in New Jersey on Tuesday, before California results even come in, could help Mrs. Clinton reach the 2,383 delegates needed to clinch the nomination. Her total includes hundreds of superdelegates—party leaders and elected officials who can back either candidate. Mr. Sanders is hoping that defeating Mrs. Clinton in the most populous state later Tuesday might give superdelegates reason to drop her and get behind his candidacy. Those superdelegates have given no indication they will shift allegiances.

Even so, Mr. Sanders isn’t backing off. In an interview that aired Sunday on CNN, he stepped up an attack on Mrs. Clinton involving the Clinton Foundation. Echoing a critique made by Republicans, Mr. Sanders said he has “a problem” with the foundation accepting money from foreign sources during her service as secretary of state.

In a news conference Saturday in California, Mr. Sanders indicated he would battle for superdelegates all the way to the convention.

“The Democratic National Convention will be a contested convention,” he said...

More at the link.

And here's that CNN interview, with Jake Tapper, "Sanders sees 'conflict' in Clinton Foundation..."

Kim R. Holmes: Leftists Now Doing 'Mopping Up' Operations in Fundamental Transformation of America

I've been aggressively recommending Holmes's book, The Closing of the Liberal Mind: How Groupthink and Intolerance Define the Left.

It turns out he's done an interview with Ginni Thomas of the Daily Caller, via Mark Tapscott, at Instapundit, "IS THE LEFT CLOSING IN FOR THE KILL ON AMERICA?"

If that strikes you as an unbalanced question, consider that the guy posing it is Kim Holmes, a former Assistant Secretary of State and a long-time foreign policy expert at the Heritage Foundation. Holmes new book – The Closing of the Liberal Mind: How Groupthink and Intolerance Define the Left – lays out all of the disturbing facts.

Holmes sat down with Ginni Thomas of the Daily Caller (yes, and the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas) to explain why he believes the Left’s various contemporary outrages constitute “a mopping-up operation and they’re going in for the kill.” Rather than merely dismissing this as another despairing old conservative, you would do well to read and hear Holmes make his case.

Out June 28th: Gary J. Byrne, Crisis of Character

Folks were tweeting out Drudge Report's shout-out to the book yesterday.

See, Gary J. Byrne, Crisis of Character: A White House Secret Service Officer Discloses His Firsthand Experience with Hillary, Bill, and How They Operate.

John C. McManus, The Dead and Those About to Die

I woke up at 6:30 and my newspaper wasn't here yet, so I laid in be and read John C. McManus's gripping account of the D-Day invasion, The Dead and Those About to Die: D-Day: The Big Red One at Omaha Beach.

He's also the author of The Americans at Normandy: The Summer of 1944 — The American War from the Normandy Beaches to Falaise, and The Deadly Brotherhood: The American Combat Soldier in World War II.

Tomorrow's the 72nd anniversary of the Normandy assault. The old-timers are quitting the scene. I recently looked up the remaining soldiers from the "Easy" Company from Band of Brothers, and just about all of them have passed away, including Major Richard Winters, who died in 2011.

I'm Endorsing Hillary Because I Don't Want to Be Killed

Lol.

It's the Dilbert cartoonist Scott Adams, via Instapundit, "My Endorsement for President of the United States."

Click through at the link. He's hilarious.

Sunday Cartoons

At Flopping Aces, "Sunday Cartoons."



Also, at Theo Spark's, "Cartoon Round Up..."

Cartoon Credit: Branco's Cartoons.

Radicalism and Identity Politics at Oberlin

It's not just Oberlin.

American academe is cancerous.

But Oberin's been in the news a lot this past few weeks, and it gives us a glimpse into our deeply troubled future.

From Robert Stacy McCain, at the Other McCain, "Oberlin College Is Decadent and Depraved":

Oberlin College Is Decadent and Depraved https://t.co/1jPM589FJo
cc @instapundit @JenniferKabbany @LegInsurrection pic.twitter.com/lHK88DCwsp

— FreeStacy (@Not_RSMcCain) June 2, 2016

It is impossible to exaggerate just how awful “elite” education in America has become, and difficult to explain why it is so bad. William F. Buckley Jr.first described the degenerate tendencies of modern elite education in his 1951 classic God and Man at Yale.

As I have summarized the book’s core insight, “Buckley saw that Yale, originally founded as a Christian school, had quietly abandoned Christianity and adopted a new religion, liberalism.” The outlines of this problem were clearly apparent to Buckley at Yale while Harry Truman was still president, yet academia did nothing to halt the decay of moral and intellectual standards, so that when university campuses erupted in riots in the 1960s — young radicals terrorizing their liberal elders — conservatives could say, “We told you so.” Liberals can never admit they’re wrong, so the lessons that should have been learned from the ’60s were ignored, and meanwhile the radicals were burrowing into the academic bureaucracy. Beginning in the 1990s, a series of purges swept through higher education. The humanities and social sciences were eviscerated and corrupted by the proponents of “critical theory.” If any student wished to learn anything about history without a Marxist filter, he had to do so by reading old books, as all the recent “scholarship” was devoted to reinterpreting the past through a prism of race/class/gender.

Meanwhile, in the name of “multiculturalism,” the curriculum was restructured, admissions criteria were altered and hiring policies were systematically biased in order to create a statistically acceptable representation of “diversity” on elite campuses. We should note, by the way, that the pursuit of “diversity” in admissions was never difficult at community colleges or second-tier state universities. It was only at the top-tier state schools (e.g., the University of Michigan and the University of California-Berkeley) and at highly selective private schools (e.g., the Ivy League) that admissions quotas became controversial. Many in academia accepted and promoted the idea that all ethnic groups had a “right” to be proportionately represented in the student body (and on the faculty) of universities, so that “underrepresentation” was considered proof of discrimination and social injustice. Equality of opportunity was not enough, equality of outcomes was demanded, and this egalitarian mission required the destruction of moral and intellectual standards in academia. Higher education has become a pervasively dishonest enterprise, a corrupt racket wherein parents, students and taxpayers are systematically swindled in order to provide lucrative employment for administrators and faculty whose income is dependent upon the illusion of “prestige” surrounding such schools as Oberlin College.

How bad is it at Oberlin? Nathan Heller of the New Yorker risked a visit to the lunatic campus and here are a few excerpts from his article...

Still more.

Why Donald Trump Was Inevitable

From political scientists Alan Abramowitz, Ron Rapoport, and Walter Stone, at the New York Review, "Why Trump Was Inevitable":

On banning Muslims, building a wall, and deporting immigrants, a majority of likely Republican voters support Trump https://t.co/fS4HEF7mr1

— NY Review of Books (@nybooks) June 2, 2016

Polling in February already showed that Trump would win a one-on-one contest against any other Republican candidate https://t.co/fS4HEEPLzt

— NY Review of Books (@nybooks) June 2, 2016

God this is depressing https://t.co/UY7uwnmniB pic.twitter.com/beQr2viDYA

— Michael Hobbes (@RottenInDenmark) June 3, 2016

One of the main reasons many political commentators were surprised by Donald Trump’s success in the primaries was his willingness to take extreme positions and use unusually harsh rhetoric in talking about immigration and related issues. Indeed, Trump’s comments about Mexican immigrants and Muslims have been at the center of his campaign. And his pronouncements on these topics have greatly concerned many Republican leaders and elected officials who feared they would harm the party’s image and damage its electoral prospects. But how did his positions and comments play with Republican primary voters?

The clear answer is that they reflected the views of likely Republican voters extremely well. We asked a series of questions about Trump’s controversial proposals (banning Muslims from entering the US, building a wall on the Mexican border, and identifying and deporting illegal immigrants). On all three issues overwhelming majorities of likely Republican voters supported his positions: almost three quarters (73 percent) favored banning Muslims from entering the US, 90 percent favored identifying and deporting illegal immigrants as quickly as possible, and 85 percent favored building a wall on the Mexican border.

Trump supporters were more in favor of these proposals than supporters of other candidates, but as Figure 3 shows, large majorities of likely Republican voters who did not support Trump for the nomination did support Trump’s positions on his three central issues. Almost two thirds favored his proposal to ban Muslims from entering the US and four fifths favored building the wall and identifying and deporting illegal immigrants. In fact 60 percent of non-Trump supporters took his position on all three of his distinctive issues.

As with electability, Trump’s positions on immigration, rather than limiting his appeal, actually gave him the potential to expand his electoral coalition.

Trump’s emergence on the political scene in the summer of 2015 was unprecedented. That someone with no office-holding experience and little previous involvement in the Republican Party could emerge as the GOP nominee seemed implausible. Media commentators, pundits, and academics continued to hold this position deep into the fall and winter, even at a time when national and state polls showed Trump to be a formidable candidate if not the inevitable nominee.

As our data here show, Donald Trump’s primary victories on his way to the nomination were not simply a result of a crowded field. Among our national sample of likely Republican primary voters, Trump was favored over every other Republican candidate in one-on-one matchups. Moreover, he was viewed as the most electable candidate by a majority of Republican primary voters, and on his distinctive issues involving immigration even those favoring other candidates overwhelmingly agreed with him.

Trump and his supporters were not in line with the opinions of a majority of Republican voters. As we showed in our earlier essay for Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball,* Trump supporters were quite distinct from other Republicans on issues like raising the minimum wage and raising taxes on upper-income households. Almost two thirds of Trump supporters favored raising taxes on incomes over $250,000 compared with only 41 percent of other Republicans, and while almost half of his supporters (48 percent) favored raising the minimum wage, that was true of less than a third of those supporting other candidates.

It is not happenstance that these are two issues on which Trump has said he may change his positions in order to “clarify” them. Whether he can maintain these more populist positions on economic issues without turning off more conservative Republican voters remains a central question for his campaign.

But regardless of how successful he is in unifying the Republican Party behind his candidacy in the future, Donald Trump was already very close to being the inevitable nominee in January 2016.

Laura Ingraham: Donald Trump Shouldn't Get Bogged Down Fighting the Media (VIDEO)

And remember, Ingraham's a huge Trump booster. But she's got a point. The presumptive nominee should stick to hammering his populist message. Tone down some of the sniping and fighting.

The only danger for Trump is for him to deviate too much from his signature combative brand, which is why many, many people support him. But still. He's got to find the balance.

Watch, from Hannity's last night:

Fresno School Bans 9-Year-Old from Wearing 'Make America Great Again' Hat on Campus

Nothing's permitted these days. Nothing.

And note that the Supreme Court ruled last year that students couldn't wear American flag t-shirts to school on Cinco de Mayo, since they might offend Latino students (who then might start a riot). It was a heckler's veto decision, but profoundly unfair either way.

Now there's more along the same lines. Poor kid.

At KFSN 30 News Fresno:

#ICYMI 9-year-old banned from wearing 'Make America Great Again' hat at school in Fresno https://t.co/rVIqMkEvV1 pic.twitter.com/QzNtD9BtHK

— ABC30 Fresno (@ABC30) June 3, 2016

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- One local Trump supporter is being banned from wearing a signature Donald Trump hat to school after it began to draw tense conversations.

Logan Autry left Powers-Ginsburg Elementary School early on Thursday because school leaders said something he was wearing is causing a safety concern on campus-- his red hat.

"The vice principal came up to me and told me to take my hat off because it brings negative attention from other students. And I said no a few times and then the principal told me again and I still said no and refused," said Logan Autry.

For three days straight the third grader wore the hat to class. But each day, more and more classmates began confronting him at recess.

"I still want to keep my hat. It's not the hat that draws attention, it's just my personality that the other children do not like," said Autry.

Autry recently moved to Fresno from the foothills, he loves politics and American history.

"He knows more than I do. He knows more about this election than I know, it's kind of embarrassing. You know, like are you smarter than a third grader kinda thing. But he is just very adamant about his beliefs and his rights. He wants to be a politician that's his goal," said Angela Hoffknecht, Logan's guardian.

He already has the shirt and tie down, and practices speeches about Trump on the playground.

"I've told them his policies on illegal immigration, and our second amendment, and our first amendment and all of our amendments that need to be protected which are not going to be an amendment at all if Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders gets elected," said Autry.

Autry got his $20-- now, controversial-- hat when he skipped school to attend a Trump rally last week.

"He doesn't speak like a politician. He speaks like a normal person. He knows what this country needs."

Autry briefly met the presidential hopeful during his local stop and even got his hat autographed...

Seattle University Dean Placed on Administrative Leave Amid Student Protests

This is actually horrifying to me.

And from a personal standpoint, I'm lucky I'm teaching at the community college level. Some, but not too much, of the radical campaign activism has seeped down to the two-year colleges. If I was at a university I'd have been hounded out by now, or I'd have self-censored my classes so much I'd by now be a shamed, fading hulk of a man. It's a terrible prospect.

At the Seattle Times, "Student protest: SU president says some in faculty also wanted dean to resign":

The sit-in started in mid-May with a group of students who demanded changes to a curriculum that emphasizes Western history and philosophy, and a climate they describe as hostile and condescending to students of color. They say they were influenced by alumni who graduated nearly a decade ago who told them they also tried to make changes to the school, to no effect...

And at Heat Street, "University Puts Dean on Leave Over ‘Too Western’ Curriculum":

Seattle University student occupiers: "We want a liberatory education" https://t.co/wl1GADVzQo pic.twitter.com/JNlNO3SfZZ

— KUOW Public Radio (@KUOW) May 22, 2016

For more than three weeks, a group of students have staged a sit-in at Seattle University’s Matteo Ricci College. One student complained to the Seattle Times that “the only thing they’re teaching us is dead white dudes.” They have demanded the resignation of Dean Jodi Kelly.

In a written statement, the protestors said that “dissatisfaction, traumatization and boredom” have characterized their time as students, “as well as being ridiculed, traumatized, othered, tokenized and pathologized.” They claim “these experiences have been profoundly damaging and erasing, with lasting effects on our mental and emotional well-being.” 

The protestors, who call themselves the MRC Coalition and say they’re “led by queer folx, womxn of color, and people of color,” issued a lengthy list of demands, including an overhaul of the college’s curriculum that “decentralizes whiteness and has a critical focus on the evolution of systems of oppression.”

Still more.

Arizona Sportscaster Paul Cicala Deletes Twitter Account After Blaming Trump Supporter for Being Attacked

Good.

I looked up the guy's Twitter feed to give him an earful. I'll bet hundreds of patriots beat me to it. Nasty stuff.

At Pat Dollard's, "Tucson NBC Sportscaster Deletes Twitter Account After Blaming Trump Supporter for Being Attacked."

#ESPN Sportscaster #PaulCicala said Trump supporter had it coming because she was wearing a Trump Jersey #TrumpRally pic.twitter.com/x1k9vZ8S6d

— Feisty☀️Floridian (@peddoc63) June 4, 2016

Flyover Nation Out June 21st!

Thanks again to all the readers who've done their shopping through my Amazon links. As y'all know by know, I've been plowing the proceeds back into more books for myself, lol. I'm picking up two or three new books at the beginning of each month, and then sometimes I buy used books while I'm out and about around town.

So, thanks again to everyone. Every little bit helps, although I still blog for the fun of it, not the money.

In any case, I'm looking forward to Dana Loesch's new book, out later this month.

At Amazon, Flyover Nation: You Can't Run a Country You've Never Been To.

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Anthony Beevor, D-Day: The Battle for Normandy.

And Stephen Ambrose, D-Day: June 6, 1944: The Climactic Battle of World War II.

Max Hastings, Overlord: D-Day and the Battle for Normandy.

Still more, John C. McManus, The Dead and Those About to Die: D-Day: The Big Red One at Omaha Beach.

BONUS: Gerhard L. Weinberg, A World at Arms: A Global History of World War II.

Kelly Brook in London

New photos, at Egotastic!, "Hot Brit Kelly Brook Super Chesty While Out In London."

Plus, flashback from 2013, "Phenomenal New Kelly Brook Sunbathing Pics From Cancun." (Very hot.)

Backlash After San Jose Protest Could Help Donald Trump

Following-up from the other day, "Vile Leftists Attack Donald Trump Supporters in San Jose (VIDEO)."

Here's far-leftist Michael Tomasky at the Daily Beast, "How Anti-Trump Violence Could Elect Him":

How anti-Trump violence could elect him: https://t.co/K3Ihy84Ey7 pic.twitter.com/bKG8oTs0ng

— The Daily Beast (@thedailybeast) June 3, 2016

Americans admire protest movements and civil disobedience, but they draw the line at violence, so harassing and beating up Trump supporters could do him a lot of good.

And, amazingly, today's front-page story at the leftist Los Angeles Times, "Anti-Trump violence is widely condemned. Will backlash help his candidacy?":

Anti-Trump violence is widely condemned. Will backlash help his candidacy? https://t.co/HIHWXfLslP #Clippers #NBA pic.twitter.com/iMRqxDHBdp

— LA Clippers News (@BBClippers_News) June 3, 2016

The violent assault on Donald Trump supporters in San Jose led to bipartisan condemnation Friday and widespread agreement that protesters crossed a line, possibly provoking a backlash that could boost the presidential hopeful.

“I know the depths of emotions that have come out,” said Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, who has campaigned across the country for Hillary Clinton, the Democratic front-runner. “But somebody who thinks they’re being helpful by throwing an egg – I would say that’s a tactical mistake.”

Hector Barajas, a Republican strategist who had expressed consternation about the presumptive GOP nominee and his inflammatory statements about Mexican immigrants, said he would vote for Trump in Tuesday’s primary and predicted others less than enamored with the Manhattan businessman would do so as well.

It is one thing to oppose Trump and “quite another to start throwing eggs, to start throwing punches and act in a thuggish way,” Barajas said. “I think you get a lot of folks who are going to look at this.... and they might not have been supportive of Trump or on the fence, but now say, ‘I’m going to vote for him; it’s needed to put an end to this ugliness.’”

Dozens of fights broke out Thursday night at the conclusion of Trump’s Silicon Valley appearance.

Demonstrators jumped on cars, stole the candidate’s trademark “Make America great again” ball cap from Trump supporters and set them on fire, and clashed with police in riot gear. Some protesters waved Mexican flags as rallygoers in Trump regalia shouted, “Go back to Mexico!”

One Trump fan was hit with an egg and others were chased and harassed, scenes that blazed across television newscasts and social media.

At least four people were arrested and a police officer was slightly injured after being hit with a metal object...

The interesting thing is that the Costa Mesa rioting was even more intense, but the images from San Jose are really personal, especially the woman getting egged surrounded by illegal immigrants with Mexican flags. It proves Trump right all along, and that's got to piss off radical progressives.

Still more.

The Great American Road Trip

Summertime and the livin' is easy, heh.

At the New York Times, "America Is Hitting the Road Again":

ON ROUTE 66 IN NEW MEXICO — Bob Pack forgot to bring his James Taylor CDs. Still, he and his brother and sister were having a blast, rolling among the sandstone mesas, ghost towns and kitschy tourist attractions.

They reminisced about family trips as children back in the 1950s, Mr. Pack and his sister, Joann, said, and not even their brother’s “annoying” habits of chewing tobacco and telling dirty jokes could ruin the drive. “I wanted to see West Texas one more time,” he said over breakfast at the Route 66 Casino Hotel.

Over in Arizona, Kay McNellen, a 23-year-old actress from San Diego, said she took to the highway almost every weekend these days, just to see how far she could drive. She has motored across the Mojave Desert, admired Sequoia National Forest and Instagrammed the Grand Canyon. “This is a better view than Netflix will give you,” she said.

The great American road trip is back.

It’s partly that gasoline this driving season is cheaper than it has been in 11 years, according to the AAA motor club, and that the reviving economy is making people more willing to part with their money. But there is more than that at play here. This may be a cultural shift, as Americans experiment with the notion that maybe money can, in fact, buy happiness, at least in the form of adventures and memories.

It is a change that appears to have taken root in the years since the 2008 financial crisis. “Postrecession, people are focused on memories that cannot be taken away from them, as opposed to tangible goods that expire and wear out,” said Sarah Quinlan, a marketing executive at MasterCard Advisors. “There’s a sense that you can take away my job, you can take away my home, but you can’t take away my memory.”

Whatever their motivation, Americans last year drove a record 3.15 trillion miles, according to the Department of Transportation, beating the previous mark, set in 2007. So far this year, both travel and gasoline consumption are up again.

The desire to get behind the wheel still comes as something of a surprise. The conventional wisdom was that driving mileage had probably peaked in 2007. The demographic bulge represented by the baby boomers is aging out of the driving years; people typically drive less as they hit retirement.

At the same time, millennials were not sharing the passion for the open road that previous generations of young adults had. Many, in fact, preferred to live in the nation’s downtowns, eschewing personal cars in favor of shared Ubers, or walking to their work and play.

But it turns out that both generations are driving more than anyone expected. “A lot of millennial behavior was really deferred assimilation,” said Steven E. Polzin, a transportation researcher at the University of South Florida. In other words, just like Mom and Dad, they were destined for a more traditional lifestyle — the marriage, the home, the garage — they just took a little longer to get there.

One such millennial is Jenna Bivone, a 29-year-old website and app designer, who two years ago left downtown Atlanta to live on the outskirts of the city with her boyfriend. “We used to walk everywhere, but the rents were too high and we wanted some land for my dog,” she said. “In a more suburban area we found good schools, stuff like that for future plans.”

Now she has a daily commute of at least a half-hour each way, and on weekends she and her boyfriend drive around Georgia and neighboring states looking for the best hiking. Over the last three years they have taken road trips in Wyoming and Colorado to hike in the national parks.

“When we travel we want to go to places we might never see again,” she said. “We’re not going to be young forever.”

Michael McNulty, a 67-year-old biotech executive from San Francisco, might not agree with the last part of her statement. Last year he bought a used Ford Airstream B-190 motor home on Craigslist for $13,000 as an experiment. He and his wife are enjoying the road trips, he said, and they are gradually extending their radius.

“The kids’ colleges are paid for, and they are out of the house,” he said. “We have been all over the world, and now we are seeing the U.S.A.”

Mr. McNulty did all the driving to the Grand Canyon for an extended weekend in April, and he prepared to drive all the way back home, 14 hours, in one day. The reason was simple, he said. “We’re going to go for it on Tuesday,” he said, smiling, “because I have to get back to work on Wednesday.”

The phenomenon is being further amplified by, of all things, a desire in some families for cross-generational adventures that harks back to a halcyon age of bundling everyone into the station wagon, counting license tags from faraway states, and mediating back-seat fights over who started the fight. Baby boomers, it seems, want to bond with their grandchildren on the road. Rental-car companies are reporting increased demand for bigger vehicles to accommodate the generations...

Still more at that top link.

Deal of the Day: Bushnell H2O Waterproof - Fogproof Binocular

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Vile Leftists Attack Donald Trump Supporters in San Jose (VIDEO)

The radical leftist protests against Donald Trump are getting more intense, more vile, and more hateful at each campaign stop, especially in California.

Even people, left and right, that don't like Trump are sympathetic if not supportive of the candidate in the face of literally violent attacks and rioting such as this. And when you have the Mayor of San Jose blaming the unrest on Trump himself, with the city's police department standing on the sidelines while innocents and peaceful participants are being brutally harassed, egged, and even beaten, then something is seriously out of whack.

At the San Jose Mercury News, "San Jose Police chief defends handling of protest":

San Jose Police Chief Eddie Garcia released a statement about the violence after the Donald Trump rally Thursday night in downtown and his department's handling of the 400 protesters:

"The violent behavior exhibited by some protestors last night was reprehensible, completely unacceptable and unrepresentative of our democracy and this City. We saw demonstrators behaving poorly and our officers clearing the streets as safely and expeditiously as possible. Officer safety and crowd control techniques are critical and cannot be abandoned when protestors scatter from area to area faster than the police lines can move.

"Furthermore, de-escalation techniques are important -- not just when someone has a weapon. We are not an "occupying force" and cannot reflect the chaotic tactics of the protestors. Instead, we achieved our goal of clearing the streets and making arrests in an appropriate manner. Our officers should be commended for both their effectiveness and their restraint.

"Let me be clear: the violence that occurred last night was not unchecked. Four arrests have already been made, and I have immediately assembled a task force, headed by the Bureau of Investigations Chief Shawny Williams, and in coordination with the Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office, to review all video evidence and investigate all reported assaults or other crimes from last night's incident. I'm calling on the public as well as media outlets to submit all video evidence to our Police Department so we can root out those whose intentions were to disrupt our civil democratic process and put the safety and welfare of the public and my officers at risk. We will work tirelessly to hold them accountable and bring them to justice."

That doesn't sound quite accurate, actually.

Folks on Twitter last night reported the police did not declare an unlawful protest until well after the rally let out, and innocents were being assaulting by the anti-Trump demons. CNN's Sara Murray has an excellent timeline of events.

More, at Memeorandum, "Ugly, bloody scenes in San Jose as protesters attack Trump supporters outside rally."

Ireri Carrasco, Open-Borders Activist, Sues Obama Administration Over Deferred Deportation (VIDEO)

I hate the entitlement. Folks like this should be the first deported under the Donald Trump administration.

At Democracy Now!:

Triple-Digit Temperatures in the Inland Empire Today (VIDEO)

Not near that hot in the L.A.-Orange County metro areas.

It was rather lovely, in fact.

Amber Lee reports, for CBS News 2 Los Angeles:

Didn't Feel Well Yesterday

I had a wonderful long Memorial Day weekend, but yesterday was a strange day at work.

Mostly, I was upset at the news of the UCLA shooting, which starting breaking around 10:30am. My office hours were busy, and then the campus fire alarm went off and faculty, staff, and students had to exit the buildings for about 20 minutes or so until the all clear was given. News trickled in, and by the time I went to teach my first class reports indicated that the shooting was a murder-suicide.

My classes were fine --- I have one section of American government and one section of international relations on Mondays and Wednesdays. (I felt a little out of it in my IR class, though, since my usual preparation was thrown off by the strange morning. Sometimes it takes a little more to get back in the swing of things, in any case. Oh well, I'll hit it out of the park during Monday's class.)

Plus, Milo Yiannopoulos ended up cancelling the talk he was going to give on campus, as he was apparently personally affected by the shooting and didn't think it was appropriate to hold a debate. (Trolls were blaming him for the shooting on Twitter, unsurprisingly.)

Gustavo Arellano, the editor of the O.C. Weekly, who was scheduled to debate Milo, did speak solo it turns out, talking about corruption in Orange County. He's an interesting guy, not the least his public profanity. He gave a shout out to this feature piece at the magazine, "Who Wants to Free a Southern California Serial Killer? Orange County DA Tony Rackauckas." I don't care for local politics that much, so it was educational for me.

(I also had a nasty bout of acid reflux late yesterday afternoon, which didn't come under control until later in the evening. So there's that.)

I'll have more blogging tonight, and then over the weekend. Next week's finals week and then I'm out for the summer. I'm looking forward to some time off from teaching.

And thanks to everyone who's been shopping at my Amazon links. As noted, I've been plowing the proceeds back into my own reading habit, so thanks again.

Have a great day.

Professor William S. Klug Killed in UCLA Murder-Suicide (VIDEO)

Watch the report, at CBS News 2 Los Angeles, "Victim In UCLA Murder-Suicide Was Engineering School Professor, Father and Husband."

And at the Los Angeles Times, "Professor killed in UCLA murder-suicide was brilliant, kind and caring, colleagues say."

No word yet on the identity of the shooter. He was a student of Professor Klug's, apparently. There was some chatter on Twitter that he was disgruntled, but there's been no reporting on this outside of posts on social media. See Claudia Peschiutta, at KNX, for example, "#UCLAshooting: Student apparently despondent about his grades shot professor & then killed himself, according to law enf source. @KNX1070."

More, from Robert Stacy McCain, "Gosh, the media sure is taking its sweet time publishing the NAME of the student who killed that UCLA professor."

And Kurt Schlichter, "From the seeming lack of media interest in the UCLA shooter's identity I assume he's someone from a politically unuseful demographic."

Donald Trump's 'Hostility' Toward the Media (VIDEO)

Well, if he's "hostile," it's a good kind of hostile. His supporters are going to be eating it up.

Watch, at CBS This Morning, "What Trump's hostility toward press could mean for possible presidency."

Deal of the Day: ASUS 128GB ZenFone 2 Special Edition

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And, from Kathryn J. Edin and H. Luke Shaefer, $2.00 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America.

Also, Matthew Desmond, Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City.

Still more, from Elizabeth Hinton, From the War on Poverty to the War on Crime: The Making of Mass Incarceration in America.

BONUS: Jason Riley, Please Stop Helping Us: How Liberals Make It Harder for Blacks to Succeed.

How Swimmer Survived Newport Beach Shark Attack (VIDEO)

Well, previous attack victims have survived by punching back twice as hard.

That's always good advice, in the water and in real life.

At the O.C. Register, "Shark attack survivor: Woman suffered one big bite across her body, a punctured lung and broken ribs":

She had wounds in a half circle across her torso, teeth marks from her upper right shoulder in the back to her pelvis in front and to the other side of her buttocks in the back.

Several ribs were fractured. A lung was punctured. She lost no less than a liter of blood. Doctors looked for teeth that might’ve still been in her body.

Maria Korcsmaros, a 52-year-old triathlete and mother of three, survived a shark attack Sunday in Corona del Mar.

She lived only because of her own quick thinking, strong work from a pair of Newport Beach lifeguards who luckily were close at hand, and medical experts who responded well to a trauma none had seen first-hand.

“It was life before limb,” said Dr. Philip Rotter, director of orthopedic trauma and chairman of orthopedics at Orange County Global Medical Center in Santa Ana.

Details of the attack emerged Tuesday as Rotter and other experts offered an inside look at what the swimmer endured Sunday and how she was treated.

They talked about how lifeguards pulled her from the water and treated her appropriately, and how emergency physicians and others later had to spring into action to treat a woman who had a tourniquet wrapped around her arm to slow the flow of blood spilling from her body.

Based on the description of the wound, local shark expert Chris Lowe, who runs The Shark Lab at Cal State Long Beach, thinks the shark was an adult, likely more than 10 feet long.

“I can tell you that’s probably not a pup.”

As medical experts discussed the events that saved Korcsmaros, Newport Beach lifeguards on Tuesday re-opened beaches between Balboa Pier and the Wedge, a stretch of water closed to swimmers since the attack. Swimmers returned to the water around noon, after lifeguards had looked into the ocean from boats and from overhead, in a helicopter, to see if any sharks remain in the area.

Corona del Mar, where the attack occurred, was opened back up Wednesday morning.

Lifeguards also described what happened during the human-vs. shark rescue...

Keep reading.

Kendall and Kylie Strip Down to Model Their New Bikini Line

I just love Kendall.

At London's Daily Mail, "Sizzling hot! Kendall and Kylie Jenner strip down to model their new bikini range."

Kendall and Kylie Jenner 🔥 🔥 🔥 https://t.co/3SLte134iT pic.twitter.com/lio7glWHZA

— Daily Mail Celebrity (@DailyMailCeleb) June 1, 2016

Giant Alligator on Golf Course in Florida (VIDEO)

Wild.

Via CNN:



RELATED: At USA Today, "2 alligators found eating dead body in Florida."

The Graying of America's Homeless

It's not an easy problem to solve. Lots of homeless people have psychiatric issues and refuse services.

It's sad.

And that's downtown Los Angeles at the background photo at the link.

See, the New York Times, "Old and on the Street: The Graying of America's Homeless" (at Memeorandum):

LOS ANGELES — They lean unsteadily on canes and walkers, or roll along the sidewalks of Skid Row here in beat-up wheelchairs, past soiled sleeping bags, swaying tents and piles of garbage. They wander the streets in tattered winter coats, even in the warmth of spring. They worry about the illnesses of age and how they will approach death without the help of children who long ago drifted from their lives.

“It’s hard when you get older,” said Ken Sylvas, 65, who has struggled with alcoholism and has not worked since he was fired in 2001 from a meatpacking job. “I’m in this wheelchair. I had a seizure and was in a convalescent home for two months. I just ride the bus back and forth all night.”

The homeless in America are getting old.

There were 306,000 people over 50 living on the streets in 2014, the most recent data available, a 20 percent jump since 2007, according to the Department of Housing and Urban Development. They now make up 31 percent of the nation’s homeless population.

The demographic shift is mirrored by a noticeable but not as sharp increase among homeless people ages 18 to 30, many who entered the job market during the Great Recession. They make up 24 percent of the homeless population. Like the baby boomers, these young people came of age during an economic downturn, confronting a tight housing and job market. Many of them are former foster children or runaways, or were victims of abuse at home.

But it is the emergence of an older homeless population that is creating daunting challenges for social service agencies and governments already struggling with this crisis of poverty. “Baby boomers have health and vulnerability issues that are hard to tend to while living in the streets,” said Alice Callaghan, an Episcopal priest who has spent 35 years working with the homeless in Los Angeles.

Many older homeless people have been on the streets for almost a generation, analysts say, a legacy of the recessions of the late 1970s and early 1980s, federal housing cutbacks and an epidemic of crack cocaine. They bring with them a complicated history that may include a journey from prison to mental health clinic to rehabilitation center and back to the sidewalks.

Some are more recent arrivals and have been forced — at a time of life when some people their age are debating whether to retire to Arizona or to Florida — to learn the ways of homelessness after losing jobs in the latest economic downturn. And there are some on a fixed income who cannot afford the rent in places like Los Angeles, which has a vacancy rate of less than 3 percent.

Horace Allong, 60, said he could not afford a one-room apartment and lives in a tent on Crocker Street. Mr. Allong, who divorced his wife and left New Orleans for Los Angeles two years ago, said he lost his wallet and all of his identification two weeks after he arrived and has not been able to find a job.

“It’s the first time I’ve been on the streets, so I’m learning,” he said. “There’s nothing like Skid Row. Skid Row is another world.”

The problems with homelessness are hardly uniform across the country. The national homeless population declined by 2 percent between 2014 and 2015, according to the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Some communities — including Phoenix and Las Vegas — have declared outright victory in eliminating homelessness among veterans, a top goal of the White House.

But homelessness is rising in big cities where gentrification is on the march and housing costs are rising, like Los Angeles, New York, Honolulu and San Francisco. Los Angeles reported a 5.7 percent increase in its homeless population last year, the second year in a row it had recorded a jump. More than 20 percent of the nation’s homeless lived in California last year, according to the housing agency.

Across Southern California, the homeless live in tent encampments clustered on corners from Venice to the San Fernando Valley, and in communities sprouting under highway overpasses or in the dry bed of the Los Angeles River. Their sleeping bags and piles of belongings line sidewalks on Santa Monica Boulevard.

Along with these visible signs of homelessness come complaints about aggressive panhandling, public urination and disorderly conduct, as well as a rise in drug dealing and petty crimes...

Keep reading.

Previous homelessness blogging here.

It's sad.

Carolina Jaramillo Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Casting Call 2017 (VIDEO)

Lovely.

Iraqi Forces Engage in Largest Battle Yet Against Islamic State (VIDEO)

Following-up from yesterday, "Iraqi Special Forces Launch Ground Assault on Fallujah (VIDEO)."

Here's the update, from last night's CBS Evening News:

Why the Next President Will Inherit a Divided Country

From Ronald Brownstein, at great piece, at the Atlantic:

These three charts explain how each party's coalition has evolved-and diverged-since 1984. https://t.co/HbAZBvrI11

— Ronald Brownstein (@RonBrownstein) May 31, 2016

Racial chasm: In '16 non-white voters could provide nearly 1/2 of all Democratic votes-but only 1/10 of GOP votes https://t.co/HbAZBvrI11

— Ronald Brownstein (@RonBrownstein) May 31, 2016

Why "this election will widen the distance between the class and racial composition of each party’s core of support" https://t.co/HbAZBvrI11

— Ronald Brownstein (@RonBrownstein) May 31, 2016