Charles Krauthammer on President Obama's Commutation for Bradley Manning (VIDEO)

A great segment.

Dr. K. just nails it.

From this afternoon, with Martha MacCallum:

Protester Sets Himself on Fire Outside Donald Trump Hotel in Washington D.C.

At ABC 7 News - WJLA Washington, and from local witness Michael Shoag

#BREAKING: Man sets fire outside Trump hotel in D.C. to protest the President-elect https://t.co/YRtDB7VNmX pic.twitter.com/Ft6nTgvgtH

— ABC7News (@ABC7News) January 18, 2017

Self immolation in front of Trump Tower DC. Guy put out fire and walked to police. Crazy is the new normal in DC. pic.twitter.com/32gea1JpJP

— Michael Shoag (@MikeShoag) January 18, 2017

More at Gateway Pundit:

Report: Anti-Trump Protester Tries to Set Himself on Fire at Trump Hotel in DC https://t.co/QiXRmhNIxc

— Jim Hoft (@gatewaypundit) January 18, 2017

Five Hours to Have the White House Ready for the Incoming President and His Family

The transition team is so meticulous they don't want the current occupant of the White House (Obama) to feel as though he's getting dumped out on the street for the incoming president (Trump).

It's pretty amazing. The best moving company in the world, or something, heh.

At NYT:

While incoming president attends inaugural events, crew of 100 transforms White House for new tenant. @juliehdavis https://t.co/cLoiyfv0Oa

— Peter Baker (@peterbakernyt) January 18, 2017

D.C. Hairstylist Tells Marla Maples to Shove Off

Ms. Maples wanted free hare-care services (for herself and Tiffany, apparently) in exchange for mentions on Ms. Maples's social media feeds, and what not.

The hairstylist works for money and told her to shove it, heh.

At WaPo:

Marla Maples tried to get out of paying a local stylist to do her and Tiffany Trump's inauguration hair https://t.co/57OWrdv1Yu

— Emily Heil (@emilyaheil) January 17, 2017

Holly Sonders

She's nice.

At Egotastic!, "Holly Sonders Golf Hottie of the Year, Again."

And at the Heavy, "Holly Sonders: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know."

Introducing @Holly_Sonders, one of the Most Beautiful Women in Golf for 2017! Photos: https://t.co/swJdpwxT74 #MBW2K17 pic.twitter.com/1GLQyJmgA8

— GOLF.com (@golf_com) January 11, 2017

Muhammad Ahmad Abdallah al-Ansi, Bodyguard to Osama bin-Laden, Sprung in Obama's Latest Guantánamo Release

I'm shaking my head.

Seriously.

From Thomas Jocelyn, on Twitter:

1. DOD finally named 10 #Guantanamo detainees transferred to Oman.

9/10 previously deemed "high" risk by JTF-GTMO.https://t.co/iEgGkx81ye

— Thomas Joscelyn (@thomasjoscelyn) January 17, 2017

4. *BREAKING* One transferred GTMO detainee was Bin Laden bodyguard, may have been selected to take part in aborted 9/11 hijackings: pic.twitter.com/NDh7awWVLd

— Thomas Joscelyn (@thomasjoscelyn) January 17, 2017

Obama Commutes Sentence of Puerto Rican Terrorist Oscar López Rivera

I had to look this guy up, at Wikipedia:

Oscar López Rivera (born January 6, 1943) is a Puerto Rican nationalist and one of the leaders of the FALN. In 1981, López Rivera was convicted and sentenced to 55 years in federal prison for seditious conspiracy, use of force to commit robbery, interstate transportation of firearms, and conspiracy to transport explosives with intent to destroy government property. In 1988 he was sentenced to an additional 15 years in prison for conspiring to escape from the Leavenworth federal prison. Lopez solicited unincarcerated supporters to obtain weapons, grenades, and C-4 explosives for use in breaking him and fellow inmates – to whom Lopez had boasted about his leadership role in the FALN – out of prison. President Obama commuted Oscar Lopez Rivera's sentence on January 17, 2017. At the time he was the longest-incracerated member of the FALN.

López Rivera was among the 14 convicted FALN members offered conditional clemency by U.S. President Bill Clinton in 1999, but rejected the offer. His sister, Zenaida López, said he refused the offer because on parole, he would be in "prison outside prison. Resident Commissioner, Pedro Pierluisi, has stated that "the primary reason that López Rivera did not accept the clemency offer extended to him in 1999 was because it had not also been extended to fellow FALN prisoner Carlos Torres and Cordero Nananin." According to New York Times writer John Broder, López Rivera "refused to accept the President's offer to commute their sentences. Mr. Clinton demanded as one of the conditions of their release that the jailed Puerto Ricans renounce the use of terrorism to achieve their aim of independence for the Caribbean commonwealth." Torres and Nananin were subsequently released from prison in July 2010...

And further:

At the time of their arrest, López Rivera and the others declared themselves to be combatants in an anti-colonial war against the United States to liberate Puerto Rico from U.S. domination and invoked prisoner of war status. They stated that U.S. courts did not have jurisdiction to treat them as criminals, and petitioned for their cases to be handed over to an international court that would determine their status. The U.S. Government, however, did not recognize their request...

Well, you can see why the dude's getting sprung. Obama loves terrorists, especially left-wing revolutionary terrorists. O probably idolized this guy. López Rivera has never expressed remorse for his "anti-colonial war against the United States." His terrorist group, the FALN (Armed Forces of National Liberation) was closely allied the Fidel Castro and the Cuban Communist regime. Indeed, Charles Krauthammer suggested on Fox News just now that the release of López Rivera may have been part of a quid pro quo in the Cuban normalization deal. This is a presidential administration that normalizes terrorism.

Thank God we have less than three days until this hated regime, this reviled Obama regime, is driven from office.

Also at the Guardian U.K., FWIW, "Obama commutes sentence for political prisoner Oscar López Rivera: López Rivera, whose commutation was announced with 208 others, has been incarcerated for 35 years for his role in fighting for Puerto Rico’s independence."

Obama Commutes Bradley Manning's Sentence

Well, supposedly it's "Chelsea Manning," but he's a she now, if you're all into the transgender identity thing (and I'm not).

Perhaps because Bradley came out as as woman and attempted suicide while in prison explains the commutation. O's always an advocate for the "oppressed."

This news is breaking.

I saw it first on Mark Knoller's feed:

Pres Obama commutes sentence of Chelsea Manning, serving 35 years for stealing and disclosing government records. Commuted to May 17, 2017.

— Mark Knoller (@markknoller) January 17, 2017

And Althouse's shock at the president's decision, as well as all the comments there, "Obama frees Chelsea Manning!"

And at the New York Times, via Memeorandum "Obama Commutes Bulk of Chelsea Manning's Sentence."

Expect updates.

National Teach-In Movement Called 'Teach, Organize, Resist'

This is literally criminal.

In California, the education code prohibits partisan indoctrination in public college instruction. These activities, starting at UCLA, are illegal.

At Campus Reform, "Profs pledge to 'use regular class time' to protest Trump":

“[Use] your classrooms...[to] protest policies of violence...segregation, and isolationism.” https://t.co/eDSwqvnqf2 #Trump

— Campus Reform (@campusreform) January 17, 2017

A national “teach-in” movement is asking professors to set aside class time between Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and the presidential inauguration to “protest” oppression and challenge “Trumpism.”

The movement, known as “Teach, Organize, Resist,” is set to kick-off on January 18, strategically “poised between Martin Luther King Jr. Day and the presidential inauguration” as an explicit means of “challenging Trumpism.”

Academics Plan 'Read In' of Michel Foucault to Protest Inauguration of Donald Trump

These people are insane.

But they're leftists, so you knew that.

At the Other McCain, "Academics Protest Trump With Public Reading of French Homosexual’s Book":

Foucault was a gay French philosopher who died of AIDS in 1984. His postmodern (or poststructural) philosophy was typical of the French Left in the decadent political and intellectual aftermath of World War II. The Communist Party was so powerful in France that, when the Kremlin wished to signal a change in the party line in 1945, the chosen messenger was Jacques Duclos, the Stalinist leader of the French Communist Party. It was the infamous “Duclos letter” that spelled the doom of CPUSA Chairman Earl Browder (who had sought to maintain the old Popular Front line) and ushered in the anti-American stance of Cold War Communism. The extraordinary influence of Communism in post-WWII France helps to explain why French intellectuals like Jean Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir were so consistently anti-American, a tradition to which Foucault was an heir, and which made him a darling of American academics, whose hatred of America is their intellectual raison d’etre...

Robert Stacy McCain should have a second career as a professor of political philosophy, heh.

Still more.

Syria Spotlights Impotence of the United Nations

This is great.

At Der Spiegel, "War and Peace: Disunity and Impotence at the United Nations":

The mandate of the United Nations is to preserve peace in the world, but when it comes to the Syrian crisis, the global body has failed badly. Will the UN's new secretary-general be able to finally introduce necessary reforms?

The UN was not created to take mankind to heaven, but to save humanity from hell.
- Dag Hammarskjöld, UN secretary-general, during a May 1954 speech.

The man who, by simply raising his hand, prevented all efforts to end the war in Syria is sitting in a bunker-like room on 67th Street in Manhattan. Chandeliers are hanging above his head, a pendulum clock is keeping the time behind him and the furniture recalls Soviet-era filmography. "We have had this problem with Syria, of course, and ...… I (have) thought a lot about it," says Vitaly Ivanovich Churkin, Russia's ambassador to the United Nations. An ironic expression on his face, the white-haired diplomat leans back in his leather chair.

Churkin is one of the men charged with saving the world. As absurd as it might sound, that is his job. The 15 members of the UN Security Council, in particular the five permanent members -- China, France, Great Britain, Russia and the United States -- bear "primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security," according to Article 24 of the Charter of the United Nations.

It is a heroic task, an idealistic notion that was born out of the ruins of World War II: The peoples of the Earth joining together to protect the only planet we have. Uniting their strength, the world's countries hoped to create a better world, a place where all people can live in dignity. And the prerequisite for doing so is peace.

In 2001, the United Nations and its then-secretary-general, Kofi Annan, received the Nobel Peace Prize "for their work for a better organized and more peaceful world." It is also thanks to the UN that nuclear war has thus far been prevented, that war criminals from former Yugoslavia were forced to stand trial and that we now have a Paris Climate Agreement, which is aimed at preventing the destruction of the world.

But what has been happening in Syria for the last five years is the opposite of peace: a proxy world war being fought on Syrian territory. It has called everything into question for which the UN stands. The images and the calls for help that innocent men, women and children have been sending out to the world via Facebook and Twitter are unbearable. And yet the world stands by, watching as though it were all merely part of a particularly long horror movie...

More.

Heh: 'Conservative Black Chick' Asks Rep John Lewis 'What Have You Done Since Selma?'

I love it.

At Instapundit, "A SPLINTERING COALITION? ‘Conservative Black Chick’ Asks Rep John Lewis ‘What Have You Done Since Selma?’"

The fact is, Lewis is a minor figure in the civil rights movement. I'm sorry he was beaten, but he's just been one sad cranky, corrupt and angry man, for so many years. I can't even listen him.

Mom and Daughter Terrorized by Turkey (VIDEO)

Don't run.

Those turkeys will chase you down like a mofo, lol.

At CBS News 2 New York:

Michelle Malkin: Hollywood Snowflakes Boycotting Trump Inauguration (VIDEO)

It's great to see Michelle back on Fox News.

On Hannity last night:

Yeah, Hmm...

Via Allahpundit, "Hmmm: FBI arrests Orlando terrorist’s wife in San Francisco..."

Yeah, that sanctuary city is for more than just illegal immigrants.

Also at the New York Times, via Memeorandum, "F.B.I. Arrests Wife of Killer in Orlando Mass Shooting."

Ruth Malhotra Pens Open Letter to Rep. John Lewis (VIDEO)

From yesterday's Fox & Friends:




And here's the letter, "Dear @repjohnlewis, I humbly request you not to boycott @realDonaldTrump's Inauguration..."

Kenneth N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics

The classic neorealist text on international relations, still in print.

At Amazon, Kenneth N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics.

A Sense of Uncertainty Grips the World

Such drama.

It's just a new administration. We had an election.

You'd think the world was coming to an end, or something.

At the New York Times, "As Trump Era Arrives, a Sense of Uncertainty Grips the World":

The Germans, angry. The Chinese, furious. Leaders of NATO, nervous, while at the European Union, alarmed https://t.co/APxXCr3dBZ

— Liebano Saenz (@liebano) January 17, 2017

LONDON — The Germans are angry. The Chinese are downright furious. Leaders of NATO are nervous, while their counterparts at the European Union are alarmed.

Just days before he is sworn into office, President-elect Donald J. Trump has again focused his penchant for unpredictable disruption on the rest of the world. His remarks in a string of discursive and sometimes contradictory interviews have escalated tensions with China while also infuriating allies and institutions critical to America’s traditional leadership of the West.

No one knows where exactly he is headed — except that the one country he is not criticizing is Russia and its president, Vladimir V. Putin. For now. And that he is an enthusiastic cheerleader of Brexit and an unaffiliated Britain. For now.

Mr. Trump’s unpredictability is perhaps his most predictable characteristic. The world is accustomed to his provocative Twitter messages, but is less clear about whether his remarks represent meaningful new policy guidelines, personal judgments or passing whims. In the interviews, Mr. Trump described the European Union as “basically a vehicle for Germany” and predicted that the bloc would probably see other countries follow Britain’s example and vote to leave.

Mr. Trump also said Germany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel, had made a “catastrophic mistake” in allowing refugees to pour into Europe.

The barrage of inflammatory comments in joint interviews published Sunday and Monday in Britain and Germany elicited alarm and outrage in Europe, even as Ms. Merkel dryly characterized Mr. Trump’s positions as nothing new.

“They have been known for a while — my positions are also known,” Ms. Merkel said Monday in Berlin. “I think we Europeans have control of our destiny.”

Her clipped response came as officials and analysts struggled with how to interpret Mr. Trump’s remarks, as well as how to react to them.

Some argued that the president-elect’s words should be regarded as tactical, intended merely to keep his options open. But nearly everyone agreed that Mr. Trump had made trouble, especially in criticizing Ms. Merkel, given her importance as a figure of stability in Europe and her campaign for re-election later this year.

For good measure, Mr. Trump had also infuriated China by using an interview on Friday with The Wall Street Journal to again question China’s longstanding One China policy. It holds that Taiwan is an inalienable part of the mainland...

So, everybody wants Trump to play by the international system's Marquess of Queensberry Rules.

It ain't happening.

More.

Also, "As Inauguration Nears, Trump Keeps World Leaders on Edge."

Jackie Johnson's Cloudy Skies Forecast

It was perfect weather today.

I went skateboarding, heh.

Here's Ms. Jackie, back in black!

Jerry Orbach in Dewar's White Label Scotch Advertisement

Just saw the photo on Twitter, and then Googled.

At the New York Times, February 17, 1989, "THE MEDIA BUSINESS: Advertising; 20 Years Of Dewar's Achievers":

PORTNOY'S COMPLAINT pic.twitter.com/VpbePgPiz1

— Sarah Marshall (@Remember_Sarah) April 9, 2016

''IT made me a Dewar's drinker,'' Jerry Orbach said yesterday, recalling his appearance 20 years ago as a young actor in the first Dewar's Profile for White Label Scotch. ''Any publicity is good when they spell your name right.''

Mr. Orbach was the first of 85 young men and women to appear in the ad, now one of the longest-running campaigns in the United States and a triumph for its creator, Leo Burnett U.S.A., the Chicago-based agency.

As it did for Mr. Orbach, the ad has persuaded many people to drink White Label. ''It helped the success of the brand in a soft market for distilled spirits,'' said Henry Yaris, United States business manager for Dewar's, ''and Dewar's became the leading brand of Scotch in the country.''

More.

Black Trump Supporter Walks Around New York City for 10 Hours, Discovers Leftist Intolerance (VIDEO)

Via Project Veritas, "Watch what happens when a PVA Journalist walks through the streets of Manhattan wearing a Trump T-shirt and hat."

Because leftists are so tolerant.

Lindsey Pelas #MLKDAY Selfie

At Drunken Stepfather, "LINDSAY PELAS FISHNET SELFIE OF THE DAY."

That's an unbelievable woman.

Anastasia Ashley Surfing Iceland (VIDEO)

Via Drunken Stepfather, "ANASTASIA ASHLEY IN ICELAND OF THE DAY."

Watch, "Anastasia Ashley in Iceland."

PREVIOUSLY: "Anastasia Ashley for Maxim."

Tucker Carlson and Jehmu Greene (VIDEO)

On Twitter, "Tucker Destroys Jehmu Greene: “Why Do You Always Bring It Back To Race?” (VIDEO)."

Also, "‘Unable to answer a question!’: Tucker Carlson clashes with Jehmu Greene (Twitchy)."

Watch, at Fox News, "Political strategist says suspicion of Russian hacking in the election was an attack on US democracy, agrees with Rep. John Lewis that Trump's presidency is illegitimate and sounds off on running for DNC chair..."

Not Much Legitimate About the Sore Loser Democrats

From Adriana Cohen, at the Boston Herald:

Since Donald Trump’s unexpected victory, Democrats have been trying to delegitimize his historic upset.

U.S. Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), who sent shock waves through the media echo chamber this weekend when he said in an NBC interview, “I don’t see this president-elect as a legitimate president. I think the Russians participated in helping this man get elected. And they helped destroy the candidacy of Hillary Clinton.” Former Clinton campaign spokesman Brian Fallon went on CNN Friday to chime in as well.

Talk about a snow job.

Clinton didn’t lose the election due to alleged Russian hacking. She lost because she was a flawed candidate who ran a bad campaign. But facts always get in the way when you’re an out-of-touch liberal trying to play the blame game...

More.

Also at NewsBusters, via Memeorandum, "Reporters Plead with MLK III to Attack Trump; Did Lewis Tweets Shake You ‘To Your Core?’."

Oh brother.

Taylor Branch, Parting the Waters

*BUMPED.*

At Amazon, Taylor Branch, Parting the Waters: America in the King Years, 1954-63.

Trumpian Horrors

At People's Cube, "Trumpian Horrors Magazine."

Heh, "Trumpian Horrors." https://t.co/eVRZV4QLU9 pic.twitter.com/Kn1Owl6EDZ

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) January 16, 2017

Farm Girl Jen, 50-Year-Old Fitness Sensation with Rippling Abs, Become YouTube Star

She's in excellent, envious shape!

At London's Daily Mail, "Fifty-year-old farmer becomes a YouTube sensation after revealing the VERY unusual secret to her rock hard abs (and it's helping her rake in $100,000 a year): Jennifer King, from North Carolina, is known as Farm Girl Jen online."

David Hines 'Days of Rage' Tweetstorm

Okay, following-up from last night, "Watch for the Left to Become Even More Ruthless."

I found the thread I was talking about: It's David Hines, and it's now Storified, "DAYS OF RAGE, pt 1+pt2: The first and second tweetstorms about Bryan Burrough's DAYS OF RAGE and political violence in 2017."

Let's not mince words: the United States of America is currently engaged in a cold Civil War.

— David Hines (@hradzka) January 14, 2017

BONUS: At the Other McCain, "Marxists Shut Down Campus Speech — Is Trump Inauguration Their Next Target?"

FLASHBACK: Barry Rubin, Silent Revolution

Since I'm blogging about all these violent crazy leftists, who worry me sometimes, here's a flashback to the late Barry Rubin's excellent book.

At Amazon, Silent Revolution: How the Left Rose to Political Power and Cultural Dominance.

Brian H. Fishman, The Master Plan

*BUMPED.*

A new book on Islamic jihad.

At Amazon, from Brian H. Fishman, The Master Plan: ISIS, al-Qaeda, and the Jihadi Strategy for Final Victory.

Watch for the Left to Become Even More Ruthless

Following-up, "American Radicals and the Change We Could Believe In."

I saw this long series of tweets, many with long individual threads, yesterday at Kurt Schlicter's. A couple of folks were linking Bryan Burrough, Days of Rage: America's Radical Underground, the FBI, and the Forgotten Age of Revolutionary Violence, and suggesting that some similar "days of rage" might well be in our (near?) future.

Watch for the left to become even more ruthless toward anyone who refuses to maintain their line of absolute hostility toward our President.

— Kurt Schlichter (@KurtSchlichter) January 14, 2017

I need to troll back through Schlicter's feed for some of the specific tweets. It seems some tweeps were even suggesting that there's current law enforcement and intelligence chatter to the effect of forthcoming political violence. But I'm not sure, so I'll come back with more if I can find it.

American Radicals and the Change We Could Believe In

As Obama's about to depart from office, there's virtually no signs that Democrats and progressives are tacking toward the center.

I spent a lot of time attending events on campus after the election, because as noted I genuinely feel for the students scared their parents will be deported. (I think folks should have information, at least so they'll understand how due process works and where to obtain legal assistance.) In one of the last ones I attending, the president of my union, with whom I've had my battles in the past, appeared positively energized by all the opportunities for radical left activism the coming Trump administration was likely to afford. And as I troll around on Twitter, especially clicking around on radical feminist feeds, etc., I'm forwarded to more and more sites and resources that throw off the same vibe. And American politics is so polarized I'm confident that unless Donald Trump has some very substantial successes, especially on the economy and jobs, he's very liable to becoming a one term president.

In any case, I read this piece at the Nation when it came out in early December, but never got around to posting it. If you check Katrina vanden Heuval's Twitter feed you'll get an idea of how febrile the radical left has become. (I'm also not discounting the possibility of political violence, but I try to put the thought of assassination out of my mind. It's just too horrifying, and I have a feeling with all the things coming down, there are some on the left who've seriously contemplated it.)

In any case, it's Eric Foner, who's now retired as a professor of history at Columbia:

Eric Foner on Obama -- American Radicals and the Change We Could Believe In via @thenation https://t.co/lPEBbzWHCL

— Katrina vandenHeuvel (@KatrinaNation) January 11, 2017

The Great Hate-Crime Hysteria

From Eric Felten, at the Weekly Standard, "Untruth and Consequences":

Impressed with this thoughtful look at the currently raging Hate War. https://t.co/85SWU4pZyA!

— Crazy Pastor (@thecrazypastor) January 15, 2017

Scottish teenager Kate Hume was no stranger to tragedy. By the time the great European powers hurtled into war at the end of July 1914, her older brother had already been dead more than two years: Violinist John “Jock" Hume was a member of Wallace Hartley's eight-man orchestra that had played on the deck of the sinking Titanic.

Just a month and a half into the Great War she received news even more devastating.

At the office in Dumfries where she worked as a "clerkess," Kate found herself with a pair of letters. The first had the signature of her older sister, about whom the last Kate knew was that she was working as a nurse in the English town of Huddersfield. The letter read: "Dear Kate, This is to say good-bye. Have not long to live. Hospital has been set on fire. Germans cruel. .  .  . My right breast has been taken away. .  .  . Good-bye. Grace."

The first letter was explained by the other, from one of Grace's fellow nurses, a Miss Mullard. "I was with your sister when she died," the letter said, explaining they had been together at a field hospital set up near the front at Vilvorde, in Belgium. The Huns attacked and burned the hospital, according to Nurse Mullard, killing over a thousand wounded men, including through beheadings. As for the nurses, the ones the Germans captured were grotesquely violated before being murdered. Grace was among them: "She endured great agony," the letter went on, detailing that counterattacking British Tommies had "caught two German soldiers .  .  . cutting off her left breast, her right one having been already cut off."

Kate shared the letters with the press. The story caused a sensation—covered not only in local Scottish papers such as the Dumfries Standard, but in London papers including the Pall Mall Gazette, the Globe, the Westminster Gazette, the Evening Standard, and everywhere in-between. The headline in the London Star was typical: "A NURSE'S TRAGEDY: Dumfries Girl the Victim of Shocking Barbarity."

With such widespread reporting, it didn't take long for Grace Hume to learn of her own grisly death. She saw placards up at the newsstand advertising the big headline "Terrible Murder of Huddersfield Nurse." She bought the local Post and, astonished by what she read, wired her father: "Reports untrue. Safe in Huddersfield."

Kate, it turned out, had made the whole thing up.

Jump forward a century and the case of the Mutilated Nurse has a newfound relevance. For we are in a new age of hoaxes, with frequent tales of Trump-inspired atrocities that have unraveled, as did so many of the stories of atrocities committed in WWI. Understanding the propaganda of the Great War may help us understand the motives and methods of the modern propaganda in what we might call the Hate War.

The Hate War got going in earnest in the immediate aftermath of the election with a raft of reports of malicious Trumpkins taunting and attacking young Muslim women, targeting them for wearing traditional religious head-coverings.

One of the most distressing of the hijab stories was that of Yasmin Seweid, who told police she was assaulted on the New York subway by marauding Trump supporters while fellow passengers did nothing, said nothing. The perpetrators were described as three drunk white men talking about Trump. "They were surrounding me from behind and they were like, 'Oh look, it's an f-ing terrorist,' " the 18-year-old Baruch College student told a CBSNewYork reporter. They pulled at her bag, breaking the strap. She said she begged to be left alone, only to be met with a torrent of abuse: "They kept saying 'you don't belong here, get out of this country, go back to your country.' " The men grabbed at her hijab, and her fellow straphangers, she suggested, were, in their cowardice, complicit: "Everyone was looking, no one said a thing, everyone just looked away."

The police didn't look away. They combed through the subway's security video looking for the men Seweid had described. They found none. Though the case was hugely publicized, no witnesses were found. Then, with the police looking to interview her again, Seweid went AWOL. When she finally turned up, "Suspicion," the New York Daily News reported, "went through the roof." Facing continued questioning by skeptical detectives, the young woman admitted she had been lying all along. The whole thing was a fraud. She was arraigned, charged with making a false report.

(If one thinks that a trifle harsh for a bit of youthful fibbing, it's worth noting that Britain, in the midst of war with Germany, prosecuted and convicted Kate Hume for her lies.)

Seweid's was hardly the only hijab hoax...

Of course not.

In fact, I can't think of a single confirmed hate crime committed by Trump supporters against Muslims or anything other progressive demographic group.

It's been all lies. Leftist lies.

But keep reading.

Matt Ryan and the Falcons Look Nearly Unstoppable

Lindsey Thiry yesterday, in real time, as well as Sports Illustrated after the win:

This Falcons team looks absolutely unstoppable.

— Lindsey Thiry (@LindseyThiry) January 15, 2017

If the Seahawks couldn't stop Matt Ryan and the Falcons, who can? (by @jjones9) https://t.co/rsBNzvQiOw pic.twitter.com/KpdZh4rMex

— Sports Illustrated (@SInow) January 15, 2017

Sunday Cartoons

At Flopping Aces, "Sunday Funnies."



Also, at Theo's, "Cartoon Roundup..."

Cartoon Credit: Legal Insurrection, "Branco Cartoon – Elmer Dud (CNN/BuzzFeed Fake News)."

Recent Storms Helped Southern California

But according to this piece at the O.C. Register, we're still not out of the woods, so to speak.

And check the photos and videos. I used to hang out at Hart Park. The storm channel doubles as a parking lot, when there's no winter storms, lol.

Here, "Recent rain gives glimmer of hope that drought could come to an end in California."

So, if SoCal's still in drought territory, how about Northern California? If the state's not catching enough runoff, who's to blame, man? Build more freakin' reservoirs, sheesh!

Recent rain gives glimmer of hope that the #drought could come to an end in Southern California https://t.co/JP2AHhgjM8

— Jessica Kwong (@JessicaGKwong) January 13, 2017

Rule 5 Sunday

Leading things off this morning is William Teach, at Pirate's Cove, "Sorta Blogless Sunday Pinup."

Also, last week's entry at the Other McCain, "Rule 5 Sunday: January Jones."

More at 90 Miles From Tyranny, "Morning Mistress."

At Bro Bible, "Sizzling Viki Odintcova is Hotter Than a Snake’s Ass in a Wagon Rut (30 PICS)."

And the Chive, "Sunday is for the Triple-B: Beers, Babes and Burgers (33 Photos)."

Goodstuff's, "GOODSTUFFs BLOGGING MAGAZINE (276th Issue): Tempest Storm's Burlesque."

At Knuckledraggin', "Your Good Morning Girls."

Political Clown Parade, "Flowing Curves of Beauty."

And from Cousin Odie, "Static Electricity ~OR~ Rule 5 Woodsterman Style."

Also, Proof Positive, "Friday Night Babe: Corinne Foxx!"

The Feral Irishman, "Friday Femme Fatale... (NSFW)."

Still more, at the Hostages, "Big Boob Friday."

Plus, at Drunken Stepfather, "STEPLINKS OF THE DAY," and "CHARLOTTE MCKINNEY IN LINGERIE OF THE DAY."

BONUS: At Maggie's Farm, "Extinct Creatures." And, from Ed Driscoll, at Instapundit, "ATLANTIC CITY CASINOS REFUSED TO GIVE PROFESSIONAL GAMBLER WHAT HE HAD WON. INSTEAD OF PAYING HIM, THEY SUED HIM: Gambler Phil Ivey Can’t Get His Millions Because Casinos Are Too Big to Fail..."

If All You See… https://t.co/5HIREXvmeH pic.twitter.com/C267D8B3Ni

— William Teach (@WilliamTeach) January 15, 2017

If You Saw Your Dog and a Stranger Both Drowning in the Ocean, Which Would You Save First?

Here's Dennis Prager:

Pity the Sad Legacy of Barack Obama

It's brother Cornel West, at the Guardian U.K., "Our hope and change candidate fell short time and time again. Obama cheerleaders who refused to make him accountable bear some responsibility":

Eight years ago the world was on the brink of a grand celebration: the inauguration of a brilliant and charismatic black president of the United States of America. Today we are on the edge of an abyss: the installation of a mendacious and cathartic white president who will replace him.

This is a depressing decline in the highest office of the most powerful empire in the history of the world. It could easily produce a pervasive cynicism and poisonous nihilism. Is there really any hope for truth and justice in this decadent time? Does America even have the capacity to be honest about itself and come to terms with its self-destructive addiction to money-worship and cowardly xenophobia?

Ralph Waldo Emerson and Herman Melville – the two great public intellectuals of 19th-century America – wrestled with similar questions and reached the same conclusion as Heraclitus: character is destiny (“sow a character and you reap a destiny”).

The age of Barack Obama may have been our last chance to break from our neoliberal soulcraft. We are rooted in market-driven brands that shun integrity and profit-driven policies that trump public goods. Our “post-integrity” and “post-truth” world is suffocated by entertaining brands and money-making activities that have little or nothing to do with truth, integrity or the long-term survival of the planet. We are witnessing the postmodern version of the full-scale gangsterization of the world.

The reign of Obama did not produce the nightmare of Donald Trump – but it did contribute to it. And those Obama cheerleaders who refused to make him accountable bear some responsibility.

A few of us begged and pleaded with Obama to break with the Wall Street priorities and bail out Main Street. But he followed the advice of his “smart” neoliberal advisers to bail out Wall Street. In March 2009, Obama met with Wall Street leaders. He proclaimed: I stand between you and the pitchforks. I am on your side and I will protect you, he promised them. And not one Wall Street criminal executive went to jail.

We called for the accountability of US torturers of innocent Muslims and the transparency of US drone strikes killing innocent civilians. Obama’s administration told us no civilians had been killed. And then we were told a few had been killed. And then told maybe 65 or so had been killed. Yet when an American civilian, Warren Weinstein, was killed in 2015 there was an immediate press conference with deep apologies and financial compensation. And today we still don’t know how many have had their lives taken away.

We hit the streets again with Black Lives Matter and other groups and went to jail for protesting against police killing black youth. We protested when the Israeli Defense Forces killed more than 2,000 Palestinians (including 550 children) in 50 days. Yet Obama replied with words about the difficult plight of police officers, department investigations (with no police going to jail) and the additional $225m in financial support of the Israeli army. Obama said not a mumbling word about the dead Palestinian children but he did call Baltimore black youth “criminals and thugs”.

In addition, Obama’s education policy unleashed more market forces that closed hundreds of public schools for charter ones. The top 1% got nearly two-thirds of the income growth in eight years even as child poverty, especially black child poverty, remained astronomical. Labor insurgencies in Wisconsin, Seattle and Chicago (vigorously opposed by Mayor Rahm Emanuel, a close confidant of Obama) were passed over in silence.

In 2009, Obama called New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg an “outstanding mayor”. Yet he overlooked the fact that more than 4 million people were stopped-and-frisked under Bloomberg’s watch. Along with Carl Dix and others, I sat in a jail two years later for protesting these very same policies that Obama ignored when praising Bloomberg.

Yet the mainstream media and academia failed to highlight these painful truths linked to Obama. Instead, most well-paid pundits on TV and radio celebrated the Obama brand. And most black spokespeople shamelessly defended Obama’s silences and crimes in the name of racial symbolism and their own careerism. How hypocritical to see them now speak truth to white power when most went mute in the face of black power. Their moral authority is weak and their newfound militancy is shallow.

More.

PHOTO: That's me and brother Cornel, at Long Beach City College, October 21, 2016.

Bella Hadid and Kendall Jenner Model of the Year Awards (VIDEO)

At Harper's:

It's the 'Glammy Gay Package'

Robin Abcarian tweets.

And her L.A. Times story here, "Breitbart provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos is shouted down at UC Davis but gets the last word."

Milo, in Gucci accesories & gold lame backpack, with roses. He returns to @UCDavis after protesters shut down his appearance last night. pic.twitter.com/RYduwTmzvo

— Robin Abcarian (@AbcarianLAT) January 15, 2017

Having now heard him speak, I can say w/authority, Milo has nothing new to say about campuses & PC. It's all cliches in a glammy gay package

— Robin Abcarian (@AbcarianLAT) January 15, 2017

Trump Open to Shift on Russia Sanctions, 'One China' Policy

At WSJ:

Trump suggests in WSJ interview he'd be open to lifting Russia sanctions and isn't committed to "One China" policy https://t.co/B1XXF7ONEF

— Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) January 14, 2017

NEW YORK—President-elect Donald Trump suggested he would be open to lifting sanctions on Russia and wasn’t committed to a longstanding agreement with China over Taiwan—two signs that he would use any available leverage to realign the U.S.’s relationship with its two biggest global strategic rivals.

In an hourlong interview, Mr. Trump said that, “at least for a period of time,” he would keep intact sanctions against Russia imposed by the Obama administration in late December in response to Moscow’s alleged cyberattacks to influence November’s election. But he suggested he might do away with those penalties if Russia proved helpful in battling terrorists and reaching other goals important to the U.S.

“If you get along and if Russia is really helping us, why would anybody have sanctions if somebody’s doing some really great things?” he said.

He also said he wouldn’t commit to America’s agreement with China that Taiwan wasn’t to be recognized diplomatically, a policy known as “One China,” until he saw what he considered progress from Beijing in its currency and trade practices.

The desire to change relations with Moscow in particular has been a goal of American presidents since tensions began rising under President Vladimir Putin’s leadership. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sought the same goal early in the Obama administration, as did President George W. Bush, who met Mr. Putin early in his first term.

But Mr. Trump’s diplomatic efforts will have to compete with those in Congress, including many Republicans, who want to see the administration take a tough line with Russia after U.S. intelligence concluded that the government of Mr. Putin sought to influence the November presidential election with a campaign of cyberhacking.

Additionally, an unsubstantiated dossier of political opposition research suggesting ties between Mr. Trump and Russia was published this past week—drawing condemnation from Mr. Trump and his team but keeping Russian espionage in the spotlight. The allegations haven’t been validated by the U.S. intelligence agencies.

Mr. Trump in the interview suggested he might do away with the Obama administration’s Russian sanctions, and he said he is prepared to meet with Mr. Putin some time after he is sworn in.

“I understand that they would like to meet, and that’s absolutely fine with me,” he said.

Asked if he supported the One China policy on Taiwan, Mr. Trump said: “Everything is under negotiation including One China.”

China has considered Taiwan a breakaway province since Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalists set up a government there in 1949, after years of civil war. Washington’s agreement to rescind diplomatic recognition of the government in Taiwan and uphold a One China policy was a precondition for the re-establishment of diplomatic relations between U.S. and China in 1979. Any suggestion in the past that the U.S. may change its stance has been met with alarm in Beijing.

On Saturday, a statement posted on the Chinese foreign ministry’s website said, “There is but one China in the world, and Taiwan is an inalienable part of China.”

It added, “we urge relevant parties in the U.S. to fully recognize the high sensitivity of the Taiwan question, approach Taiwan-related issues with prudence and honor the commitment made by all previous U.S. administrations.”

Though he has long been critical of China, Mr. Trump on Friday also made a point of showing a holiday greeting card he received from China’s leader, Xi Jinping...

More.

The My Pillow Success Story

I know I've joked about it before, but this dude's a darned ringer for political scientist Larry Sabato, dang!

At Business Week:

The preposterous success story of the creator of MyPillow https://t.co/9pI7e4VysI pic.twitter.com/fnUnruzBMR

— Businessweek (@BW) January 12, 2017

Why the Left Hates Donald Trump So Intensely

From Thomas Lifson, at American Thinker (via Maggie's Farm):

@MrTommyCampbell @JordanUhl @BarackObama pic.twitter.com/My9UDIidYJ

— Trump dog! (@charliek478) January 15, 2017

The intensity of the hatred for a newly elected president faced by Donald Trump is equaled only by the reaction of the Confederacy to the election of Abraham Lincoln.  That ended up in civil war, a precedent that one hopes will not be equaled.  But there has been a remarkable fury at people who do not shun Trump: boycotts of a company whose shareholder contributed to a PAC supporting  Trump; attempts to pressure the president of a historically black college to prevent its marching band from performing at the inaugural; and hateful rhetoric at Hollywood awards ceremonies.  With much more to come.

A useful perspective is to regard this as a religious conflict.  Cults behave exactly the way the left is behaving when a member leaves the fold.  And remember that Donald Trump used to be a member in good standing of the Democrat cultural machine.  He even had a show on NBC, a mainstay of the left, in addition to being a generous contributor to many Democrats...

More.

Valerie Van Der Graaf Intimates Sports Illustrated Swimsuit 2017 (VIDEO)

Lovely.

Epic Ski Conditions in the Sierras (VIDEO)

This is the bright side of the storm.

The darker side is all the flooded and mudded residents trying to dig out.

At KCRA News 3 Sacramento:

Erika Canela, Brazil's 'Best Bottom' Winner, Gets Donald Trump Tattoo for Women's Rights

Totally bizarre.

At WWTDD, "Miss Bum Bum Erika Canela Gets a Trump Tattoo."

Also at the Scottish Sun U.K., "RUMPY TRUMPY: Miss Bum Bum contest winner Erika Canela has the face of DONALD TRUMP tattooed on her back in bizarre bid to improve his opinion on women and migrants - Stunning Erika Canela also admitted that she finds the 70-year-old President-elect 'strangely attractive'."

Stunning Erika Canela also admitted that she finds Donald Trump 'strangely attractive'
https://t.co/y0lYMWlHGp

— The Scottish Sun (@ScottishSun) January 13, 2017

BONUS: "Miss Bum Bum 2016 finalists strip topless to prove they're not just packing booty."

Well, she's definitely got the best buns.

Cody Wilson, Come and Take It

*BUMPED*

My winter break's about half over now, so I don't know when I'll be able to get to this book, but it looks awesome.

The dude's known as a "crypto-anarchist," heh.

At Amazon, Cody Wilson, Come and Take It: The Gun Printer’s Guide to Thinking Free.

Pippa Bacca

I did not know this, but it's true. At Wiki:

Giuseppina Pasqualino di Marineo (9 December 1974 – 31 March 2008), known as Pippa Bacca, was an Italian artist who, together with a fellow artist, was hitchhiking from Milan to the Middle East to promote world peace, symbolically wearing a wedding dress during her trek. Arriving in Gebze, Turkey on 31 March 2008, she went missing. Her raped body was discovered in the same city on 11 April. The police arrested a man who had placed his SIM card into Bacca's mobile phone and he later led them to her body.

Via Jenna Jameson:

Killed in turkey.... such a shame pic.twitter.com/roM1fuPaU8

— Jenna Jameson (@jennajameson) January 3, 2017

Bwahaha! Congressman John Lewis Looks Exactly Like Crying Baby Mask!

This is great.

Following-up, "Donald Trump Blasts John Lewis."

Seen just now on Twitter, via Andrew Arlink:

@AndrewArlink @RaymondSmith54 @youlivethrice @repjohnlewis Is it just me or does rep Lewis look exactly like the crying baby mask? pic.twitter.com/ggQOQtUUsx

— Wyatt G (@WyattGoodtimes) January 14, 2017

President Obama Led the U.S. in Endless Wars, After Being the Most Antiwar Senator in 2007

O's biggest pitch back in 2007 was that he never voted for the Iraq war. (Of course, he wouldn't have, since he wasn't in Congress at the time, but still.)

I wrote about it back in 2012, "As the Nation Remembers This Memorial Day, Don't Forget That Barack Obama Was Most Antiwar Candidate for President Since George McGovern."

Except for folks on the very far left (think wackos like Code Pink and International ANSWER), progressive-leftists gave him a pass.

Today, Obama leaves office amid an unprecedented expansion of America's wars, which now rage across the Central Asia and Middle East, the Persian Gulf, and Central and North Africa.

Yay!

At LAT, "President Obama, who hoped to sow peace, instead led the nation in war":

Before he took office in 2008, Barack Obama vowed to end America’s grueling conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. During his second term, he pledged to take the country off what he called a permanent war footing.

“Our systematic effort to dismantle terrorist organizations must continue,” he said in May 2013. “But this war, like all wars, must end. That’s what history advises. It’s what our democracy demands.”

But Obama leaves a very different legacy as he prepares to hand his commander-in-chief responsibilities to Donald Trump.

U.S. military forces have been at war for all eight years of Obama’s tenure, the first two-term president with that distinction. He launched airstrikes or military raids in at least seven countries: Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen, Somalia and Pakistan.

Yet the U.S. faces more threats in more places than at any time since the Cold War, according to U.S. intelligence. For the first time in decades, there is at least the potential of an armed clash with America’s largest adversaries, Russia and China.

Obama slashed the number of U.S. troops in war zones from 150,000 to 14,000, and stopped the flow of American soldiers coming home in body bags. He also used diplomacy, not war, to defuse a tense nuclear standoff with Iran.

But he vastly expanded the role of elite commando units and the use of new technology, including armed drones and cyber weapons.

“The whole concept of war has changed under Obama,” said Jon Alterman, Middle East specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a nonprofit think tank in Washington.

Obama “got the country out of ‘war,’ at least as we used to see it,” Alterman said. “We’re now wrapped up in all these different conflicts, at a low level and with no end in sight.”

The administration built secret drone bases and other facilities in Africa and the Middle East, and added troops and warships in the western Pacific. It also moved troops and equipment to eastern Europe to counter a resurgent Russia.

Along the way, Obama sometimes quarreled with his top military advisors. After they left the Pentagon, Obama’s first three secretaries of Defense — Robert M. Gates, Leon E. Panetta and Chuck Hagel — accused the Obama White House of micromanaging the military.

Obama’s political rise famously began with a speech he gave in Chicago in October 2002, when he announced he was “opposed to dumb wars,” referring to the planned invasion of Iraq by the George W. Bush administration.

But as president, Obama found himself caught in the fierce cross currents of the so-called Arab Spring uprisings that roiled much of the Middle East and North Africa in 2011, leading to harsh crackdowns across the region. Only one country, Tunisia, ultimately saw a transition to democracy.

He reluctantly approved a NATO air campaign in Libya initially aimed at preventing massacres of civilians by strongman Moammar Kadafi.

Determined to avoid the kind of nation building that pulled the U.S. into Iraq’s civil war, he withdrew after Kadafi was killed — only to see the oil-rich country collapse in conflict and become a magnet for terrorist groups.

The danger was clear after members of the Islamic militant group Ansar al Sharia stormed a U.S. diplomatic compound and nearby CIA base in Benghazi, in eastern Libya, in September 2012, killing U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans.

The messy aftermath in Libya made Obama realize the limitations of military power in achieving U.S. goals, and that shaped the rest of his presidency...

Still more.

Sistine Stallone LOVE Advent 2016 (VIDEO)

There's still a few more of these I haven't posted.



Also, at Vanity Fair, "Get to Know the Stallone Sisters, This Year’s Miss Golden Globes."

Toby Keith: 'I'm not sorry...'

At Daily Mail:

Toby Keith defends decision to perform at Trump's inauguration: "I don't apologize." https://t.co/nt9RHyv3F7

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) January 14, 2017

And meanwhile, Jennifer Holliday's pulled out:

Oh for crying out loud. https://t.co/Hqv2EFcD75

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) January 14, 2017

Jennifer Holliday quits inauguration, says @kpfallon convinced her https://t.co/cF54nez4rD

— Justin Miller (@justinjm1) January 14, 2017

Why Jennifer Holliday decided against performing at Trump's Inaug https://t.co/ZeyA3jx1jN

Here's @kpfallon's piece https://t.co/MIRdpKAXlQ pic.twitter.com/Mh0yYHkm7x

— Colin Jones (@colinjones) January 14, 2017

Donald Trump Blasts John Lewis

At USA Today:

Good: Trump blasts Rep. Lewis for saying his election not legitimate. https://t.co/E7qEKpEut1

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) January 14, 2017

Congressman John Lewis should spend more time on fixing and helping his district, which is in horrible shape and falling apart (not to......

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 14, 2017

mention crime infested) rather than falsely complaining about the election results. All talk, talk, talk - no action or results. Sad!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 14, 2017

'Stolen Election'

I'm pretty tired of it, but Krauthammer's right: the Dems seemed to have found some kind of voice, after being absolutely stunned into silence on November 8th, and that voice is to scream theft and illegitimacy.

And Dr. K's right: the people know what's up. The people know who won. Trump takes office next week, and by then this screaming about stolen elections is over. It's on to governing and opposition.

But if anything, for me, it's the reality of a new regime, and the fact that we are a country that hates opposing partisans with a blinding heat.

Gird your loins.

Marine Le Pen's World: French Nationalism at Heart of Her Campaign

At Blazing Cat Fur:

PARIS — France — as envisioned by far-right leader Marine Le Pen — should be its own master and have no globalization issues, European Union membership or open borders.

It would join the United States and Russia in a global battle against Islamic militants. Francs, not euros, would fill the pockets of French citizens. Borders would be so secure that illegal immigration would no longer fuel fears of terror attacks or drain public coffers.

It’s a vision that holds increasing appeal for voters once put off by the image of Le Pen’s anti-immigration party as a sanctuary for racists and anti-Semites. It has made Le Pen a leading candidate in France’s presidential election this spring...

Keep reading.

PREVIOUSLY: "France’s Next Revolution? A Conversation With Marine Le Pen."

Emily Ratajkowski Wears Nothing but Guitar Picks in Body Paint Video

At Sports Illustrated, "Emily Ratajkowski Wears Nothing but Guitar Pick - Bikini Body Painting - Sports Illustrated Swimsuit."

Rebecca Traister Unhinged

Will Roe v. Wade be overturned anytime soon?

I don't think so, but leftists have become deranged over the prospect, as well as over new regime's threat to so-called "reproductive freedom."

Now, while I don't think Roe will be taken down, I do expect more movement to weaken Planned Parenthood, including defunding the left's key abortion provider (genocide provider).

In any case, get a glimpse into leftist "pro-choice" thinking with this piece from far-left Rebecca Traister, at New York Magazine.

Notice the completely over-the-top rhetoric. It's like worlds are crashing down. An "extinction-level event," in the words of Twitter leftists.

Seriously, these people need to get a grip.

Rebecca Traister breaks down the right's step-by-step attack on access to abortion and contraception https://t.co/N1XPzeI5vj.

— NYMag PR (@nymagPR) January 10, 2017

Self-Defense Against Animals

An interesting piece.

At Instapundit, "NEWS YOU CAN USE."

I'm always worried about a mountain lion attack when I go on my big hikes at Peters Canyon.

Biloxi, Mississippi, Renames MLK Holiday ''Great Americans Day'

Oh boy, here we go.

A debate on racism and and national holidays the weekend before Donald Trump takes office.

At the Biloxi Sun Herald, "Biloxi called Monday ‘Great Americans Day’ and the internet exploded":

https://twitter.com/CityofBiloxi/status/820047337863151618?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

The city of Biloxi, MS calls MLK Day "Great Americans Day"...when they also mark Robert E. Lee's birthday.

Twitter is not about that BS: 👏🏽 pic.twitter.com/WWNrhHNNYu

— Fusion (@Fusion) January 14, 2017

It only took a few minutes after the City of Biloxi posted a Facebook status and tweet — noting that offices would be closed Monday for “Great Americans Day” — for people to start responding.

For the record, Monday is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, a federal holiday.

Great Americans Day doesn’t exist as a holiday in Google, Wikipedia or for the Mississippi Secretary of State’s Office, which recognizes a joint celebration of Martin Luther King Jr.’s and Robert E. Lee’s birthdays. It also did not appear in a LexisNexis search of all Mississippi news sources for the past 20 years.

Two hours after it was posted, the Facebook post had 64 comments and 91 shares and the responses to the city’s tweet include words that can’t be repeated on this website or in this newspaper.

The kindest were some variation of “I beg your pardon,” or “Autocorrect seems to have accidentally misspelled MLK Day.”

The city, for it’s part, then issued a series of tweets defending the name and touting its Martin Luther King Jr. Day events.

Within two hours, the Facebook post also had been amended to add that Great Americans Day was a state-named holiday and to include a link to its MLK events.

Also at Complex, "A Mississippi City Called MLK Day 'Great Americans Day' and Twitter Went Nuts."

Goldman Sachs, With Long History of Public Service, Makes Return to Washington in Trump Administration

This is pretty fascinating.

At NYT, "Goldman Sachs Completes Return From Wilderness to the White House":

“Government Sachs” is back. In the Trump administration, economic policy making is being handed to Goldman alumni. https://t.co/xOpGGxPGl3

— The New York Times (@nytimes) January 12, 2017

“Government Sachs” is back.

After eight years in the political wilderness, its name synonymous with the supposedly undue and self-serving influence in Washington that brought us the financial crisis and the Wall Street bailout, Goldman Sachs is again making its presence felt. In the Trump administration, to an unprecedented degree, economic policy making is largely being handed over to people with Goldman ties.

The Goldman alumni include Steven T. Mnuchin, the nominee for Treasury secretary; Gary D. Cohn, tapped as director of the National Economic Council and White House adviser on economic policy; and Stephen K. Bannon, who was named chief White House strategist. Jay Clayton, named to head the Securities and Exchange Commission, is a Wall Street lawyer who has represented Goldman.

This week President-elect Donald J. Trump hired Dina H. Powell, a Goldman partner who heads impact investing, as a White House adviser. Anthony Scaramucci, a Goldman alumnus (whom I spotlighted last week), is on the Trump transition committee and is expected to be named to a White House position as well.

And this after Mr. Trump campaigned against Wall Street, excoriated Senator Ted Cruz for his ties to Goldman, and castigated Hillary Clinton for giving paid speeches to big banks, Goldman among them.

The Goldman influx has so far drawn little criticism, perhaps because worries about what once would have been deemed undue influence now mix with relief that there is some adult supervision in the executive branch.

On balance, “it’s a plus,” Michael R. Bloomberg, the former New York City mayor who built his fortune on Wall Street, told me this week. “Whatever you may think of them individually, you can’t get to be a Goldman partner and survive if you’re stupid, lazy or unprofessional.” (Mr. Bloomberg is co-chairman of Goldman’s “10,000 Small Businesses” initiative, which provides support to fledgling entrepreneurs.)

Whatever bricks Mr. Trump threw at Wall Street during the campaign, investors have cheered his victory, driving the stock market to new highs. And Goldman has been a particular beneficiary, with its shares gaining 35 percent since Election Day — the top-performing stock in the Dow Jones industrial average in that time.

Mr. Trump, a spokeswoman of his told me, sees no contradiction here. There’s a difference between individuals who happen to have worked at Goldman Sachs, at some point in their careers, and Goldman Sachs itself. “He’s said from the beginning that he’ll hire the very best people for the job regardless of where they worked before, which is what he’s done throughout his career,” said the spokeswoman, Hope Hicks.

While the firm’s influence in a Trump administration may reach a new apex, Goldman alumni have long been fixtures in both Republican and Democratic administrations. The Goldman legend Sidney J. Weinberg headed Franklin D. Roosevelt’s influential Business Advisory and Planning Council.

Recent Treasury secretaries with Goldman roots include Robert E. Rubin, a former co-chairman, under Bill Clinton; and Henry M. Paulson Jr., a former chairman and chief executive, under George W. Bush.

Even in the Obama administration, where a Goldman pedigree was something akin to a scarlet letter, Gary Gensler was credited with reviving a moribund Commodity Futures Trading Commission and might have been Treasury secretary had Mrs. Clinton won in November.

Which raises the question: Why would such a disproportionate number of the “best people,” in Mr. Trump’s view, come from just one bank? After all, Goldman is hardly the only large bank, and it is also far from the biggest. It employs roughly 33,000 people; JPMorgan Chase’s work force is many times as large.

Many point to a unique Goldman culture that has long encouraged public service and philanthropy as integral to its business model.

Goldman “does seem to produce people who are very smart and have valuable experience,” Mr. Bloomberg said. “And they have a culture and a long tradition of leaving the firm for public service. The firm pushes them to do that.”

More.

Police Charge Black Female Student for KKK Threat Made at Arundel High School (VIDEO)

Man, I would not want to live in Baltimore.

And remember, it's all hoaxes all the time on the left. The real political violence we're seeing is black on white, leftists on Trump supporters.

At CBS News 13, "Police Charge Student for Threat Made at Arundel High School."

Added: The threats were made on Twitter; see the screencaps here.

Selena Gomez Goes Nearly Nude on Instagram

Arianny Celeste tweeted the story, but it's also at Huffington Post, "So Now There’s a Picture of Selena Gomez in a Thong on Instagram."

Ah, the celebrity life. Must be rough posting photos of your bare booty to social media, lol.

Obama Has Collapsed the Appeal of the Democrat Party. What Next for the Donkey Dunderheads?

That emerging Democrat majority thesis sure took a whacking in this election, sheesh.

Here's Ronald Brownstein, at the Atlantic, "What Happens to the Democratic Party After Obama?":

What happens to the Democrat Party after #Obama? #Trump #TrumpTrain #DEMS #MAGA https://t.co/hxIrPqowei via @RonBrownstein

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) January 13, 2017

The outgoing president narrowed the party’s appeal in ways that helped the GOP. Democrats may need to widen it again if they hope to recover power.

In his bittersweet farewell address this week, President Obama made a passionate case for both his policy agenda and his civic vision of a nation strengthened by diversity. But his words won’t settle the Democrats’ difficult debate about his political legacy.

Through two terms, Obama deepened the Democrats’ connection with a constellation of growing groups, namely minorities, the millennial generation, and college-educated whites, especially women. That coalition allowed him to join the ranks of Andrew Jackson and Franklin Roosevelt, the only Democrats to win a presidential popular-vote majority at least twice.

But Obama also narrowed the Democrats’ appeal, both demographically and geographically, in ways that helped Republicans seize unified control of the White House and Congress and establish their biggest advantage in state governments since the 1920s.

Both these positive and negative trends for the Democratic Party predate Obama’s first campaign, and the latter trends were accentuated by Hillary Clinton’s unique weaknesses in 2016. But Obama intensified these dynamics with a distinctive strategy that bound Democrats to the political priorities of their heavily urbanized new coalition, especially on cultural issues from gay rights to immigration reform. That came at the price of further alienating the GOP’s competing coalition of older, blue-collar, and religiously devout whites, who live largely outside of urban areas. And it was those voters who mobilized to narrowly elect Trump and preserve Republican control of Congress...

Well, it's going to be interesting to see how long leftists cling to the emerging majority thesis?

All they have to do is keep pushing the date back for majority status, and voila! Their theory is validated. Yet lots of analysts are now saying that the white working class vote is itself an emerging voting bloc, which could be a powerful swing vote in upcoming elections. Is that bloc up for grabs? At this point, most Democrats don't seem to care, despite warnings of dire political consequences to their indifference.

But we'll see. We'll see.

Still more.
 

Bill O'Reilly's Talking Points Memo: Media's 'Garbage' Reporting is 'Harming the Fabric of Our Society' (VIDEO)

Oh boy, this is an excellent segment, from last night:

Trump Didn't Kill Conservatism

A review of Patrick J. Deneen’s Conserving America? Essays on Present Discontents, at the Wall Street Journal.

And shop, Save Up to 20 Percent on Books.

The Deep State Goes to War Against President-Elect Trump, as Dems Cheer (VIDEO)

Honestly, I don't think Glenn Greenwald is a good person --- he helped smuggle Edward Snowden's stolen NSA data into Germany, to Laura Poitras (and that's not mentioning his rabid anti-Israel politics) --- but I swear he's been doing the best writing on the Democrats spy-ops smear-ops to take down the incoming Donald Trump administration.

So, with the usual FWIW warning, at the Intercept, "The Deep State Goes to War With President-Elect, Using Unverified Claims, as Democrats Cheer":

The legitimate and effective tactics for opposing Trump are being drowned by irrational, desperate ad hoc crusades. https://t.co/athCFT9IeO

— The Intercept (@theintercept) January 11, 2017

IN JANUARY 1961, Dwight Eisenhower delivered his farewell address after serving two terms as U.S. president; the five-star general chose to warn Americans of this specific threat to democracy: “In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.” That warning was issued prior to the decadelong escalation of the Vietnam War, three more decades of Cold War mania, and the post-9/11 era, all of which radically expanded that unelected faction’s power even further.

This is the faction that is now engaged in open warfare against the duly elected and already widely disliked president-elect, Donald Trump. They are using classic Cold War dirty tactics and the defining ingredients of what has until recently been denounced as “Fake News.”

Their most valuable instrument is the U.S. media, much of which reflexively reveres, serves, believes, and sides with hidden intelligence officials. And Democrats, still reeling from their unexpected and traumatic election loss, as well as a systemic collapse of their party, seemingly divorced further and further from reason with each passing day, are willing — eager — to embrace any claim, cheer any tactic, align with any villain, regardless of how unsupported, tawdry, and damaging those behaviors might be.

The serious dangers posed by a Trump presidency are numerous and manifest. There is a wide array of legitimate and effective tactics for combating those threats: from bipartisan congressional coalitions and constitutional legal challenges to citizen uprisings and sustained and aggressive civil disobedience. All of those strategies have periodically proven themselves effective in times of political crisis or authoritarian overreach.

But cheering for the CIA and its shadowy allies to unilaterally subvert the U.S. election and impose its own policy dictates on the elected president is both warped and self-destructive. Empowering the very entities that have produced the most shameful atrocities and systemic deceit over the last six decades is desperation of the worst kind. Demanding that evidence-free, anonymous assertions be instantly venerated as Truth — despite emanating from the very precincts designed to propagandize and lie — is an assault on journalism, democracy, and basic human rationality. And casually branding domestic adversaries who refuse to go along as traitors and disloyal foreign operatives is morally bankrupt and certain to backfire on those doing it.

Beyond all that, there is no bigger favor that Trump opponents can do for him than attacking him with such lowly, shabby, obvious shams, recruiting large media outlets to lead the way. When it comes time to expose actual Trump corruption and criminality, who is going to believe the people and institutions who have demonstrated they are willing to endorse any assertions no matter how factually baseless, who deploy any journalistic tactic no matter how unreliable and removed from basic means of ensuring accuracy?

Keep reading.

PREVIOUSLY: "Glenn Greenwald: Leftist Media Protect Hillary Clinton (VIDEO)."

Protesters Torch Chargers Memorabilia in San Diego (VIDEO)

Well, luckily only mementos got scorched.

At ABC News 10 San Diego:

Dana Loesch: Sorry, Not Sorry

She's an awesome woman!

Quick note to the haters in my timeline pic.twitter.com/1ZUtoaMqPv

— Dana Loesch (@DLoesch) January 11, 2017

Rising Waters of the Russian River (VIDEO)

And folks are still debating if the drought's over, pfft.

Here's CBS News San Francisco:

How Will Los Angeles Welcome the Chargers?

Following-up from yesterday, "Bill Plaschke: #Chargers Move to Los Angeles is Bad for Everyone."

Here's Lindsey Thiry with Gary Klein:

Woman of Color Lady Liberty on New U.S. Currency

Doesn't bother me.

That's a nice looking coin!

For the First Time, Lady Liberty Depicted as a Woman of Color on U.S. Currency https://t.co/UffU5lHduw

— EAGLE WINGS (@ConstanceQueen8) January 13, 2017

Los Angeles Foothills Fight Mudslides After the Storm (VIDEO)

It rained today for quite a bit. Not hard downpours, but consistent rain this afternoon.

At CBS News 2 Los Angeles: