'Black Magic Woman'

From yesterday afternoon's drive-time, at the Sound L.A.

Note, back then, Gregg Rolie, who later co-founded Journey, was Santana's lead singer.

Magic Man
Heart
4:56 PM

Simple Man
Lynyrd Skynyrd
4:51 PM

Doctor My Eyes
Jackson Browne
4:48 PM

Have a Cigar
Pink Floyd
4:43 PM

Can't You See
The Marshall Tucker Band
4:37 PM

Message In a Bottle
The Police
4:32 PM

Help Me, Rhonda
The Beach Boys
4:29 PM

Bohemian Rhapsody
Queen
4:24 PM

Sweet Emotion
Aerosmith
4:19 PM

One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer (Live)
George Thorogood
4:11 PM

Jet
Paul McCartney & Wings
4:07 PM

I've Seen All Good People: A. Your Move / B. All Good People
Yes
4:00 PM

Black Magic Woman / Gypsy Queen
Santana
3:54 PM

I Won't Back Down
Tom Petty
3:52 PM

Tush
ZZ Top
3:49 PM

Space Oddity
David Bowie
3:45 PM

You Really Got Me
Van Halen
3:35 PM

Nina Agdal Goes Topless (VIDEO)

Via Sports Illustrated:



Plus, bonus topless at WWTDD.

Our Responsibilities as the Survivor Generation

From Daniella Greenbaum, at Commentary, "A Reminder Not to Forget."

A Reminder Not to Forget - by @DGreenbaum https://t.co/TL382Fy2sc pic.twitter.com/Hap1lanYa6

— Commentary Magazine (@Commentary) April 25, 2017

Bill Nye and Rachel Bloom Demonstrate Why Trump Won

This is from a few weeks back. I've been meaning to post it. First seen on Twitter, at Countermoonbat's feed.

Seriously, this makes even progressives cringe. It's bad.

I know it's a cliche now but my god, this is why Trump won. pic.twitter.com/xT8co3YZu1

— Jason C. (@CounterMoonbat) April 24, 2017

BONUS: At Pajamas, "Bill Nye the 'Vagina Guy' Indoctrinates Kids Into Gay Sex on Netflix."

UPDATE: Leftists tried to take down the video after the outrage, but the Internet is forever. Here's copy of the clip on YouTube, "My Sex Junk by Rachel Bloom ft. Bill Nye the Science Guy."

Democrats Look to 2020

Well, this oughta be good, heh.

At NYT:

New 2020 names:
- national donors prodding GARCETTI
- MOULTON not ruling it out in private
- and LANDRIEU! https://t.co/aEAUaXtvHC

— Alex Burns (@alexburnsNYT) May 1, 2017

Susan A. Brewer, Why America Fights

At Amazon, Susan A. Brewer, Why America Fights: Patriotism and War Propaganda from the Philippines to Iraq.

On the evening of September 11, 2002, with the Statue of Liberty shimmering in the background, television cameras captured President George W. Bush as he advocated the charge for war against Iraq. This carefully staged performance, writes Susan Brewer, was the culmination of a long tradition of sophisticated wartime propaganda in America.

In Why America Fights, Brewer offers a fascinating history of how successive presidents have conducted what Donald Rumsfeld calls "perception management," from McKinley's war in the Philippines to Operation Iraqi Freedom. Her intriguing account ranges from analyses of wartime messages to descriptions of the actual operations, from the dissemination of patriotic ads and posters to the management of newspaper, radio, and TV media. When Woodrow Wilson carried the nation into World War I, he created the Committee on Public Information, led by George Creel, who called his job "the world's greatest adventure in advertising." In World War II, Roosevelt's Office of War Information avowed a "strategy of truth," though government propaganda still depicted Japanese soldiers as buck-toothed savages. After examining the ultimately failed struggle to cast the Vietnam War in a favorable light, Brewer shows how the Bush White House drew explicit lessons from that history as it engaged in an unprecedented effort to sell a preemptive war in Iraq. Yet the thrust of its message was not much different from McKinley's pronouncements about America's civilizing mission.

Impressively researched and argued, filled with surprising details, Why America Fights shows how presidents have consistently drummed up support for foreign wars by appealing to what Americans want to believe about themselves.

The Syrian Horrorscape

Obama's legacy in Syria.

At the New York Review of Books, "In the Horrorscape of Aleppo":

In the Horrorscape of Aleppo. https://t.co/ifTryoXPRY via @nybooks

— Michiko Kakutani (@michikokakutani) May 2, 2017

Over six years of war, millions of Syrians have suffered; beyond the almost 500,000 killed, many more have been paralyzed, disfigured, blinded, traumatized, and uprooted from their homes and communities. As of January, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) had registered nearly five million Syrian refugees, in addition to the six million displaced within the country. The demolished neighborhoods of eastern Aleppo make this brutally clear. They contained more than half of Aleppo’s population, until opposition fighters began seizing the area in 2012. Although measures of population movement are guesses at best, international aid agencies report that at least 50,000 eastern Aleppines fled to the western part of the city to avoid shelling by the regime or chaotic jihadist rule. Thousands more made their way to the government-controlled, war-free coastal cities of Latakia and Tartous, to Lebanon, or to Turkey, which offered visa-free entry, work permits, and, for many months in 2015, a blind eye to any who dared the perilous sea route to Europe.

In December 2016 the Syrian army, with Russian support, conquered the last insurgent strongholds in Aleppo’s east. UNHCR officials believe that about 36,000 people, rebels and their families, departed by bus under Russian protection for the opposition redoubt in Idlib province. What they left behind conjures memories of Dresden, Coventry, and Tokyo in the aftermath of World War II. The multiple forms of destruction testify to the ingenuity of the world’s arms factories. Bombs have transformed Aleppo into an Escher-like vision of six-foot-thick concrete slabs twisted into braids; five-story apartment buildings compressed into piles ten feet high; and collapsed façades of entire streets exposing rooms with ceiling fans eerily intact and revolving in the wind.

This is the horrorscape to which many residents are returning, only to find themselves still homeless. They camp in makeshift tents beside the remains of their homes, sticking close by to deter thieves from seizing unclaimed land at a time when many deeds have been lost or destroyed. Some sleep inside buildings that are exposed to the elements and subject to collapse at any moment. Children die when balconies crumble or they find shiny objects that turn out to be unexploded bombs...

Almost unbelievable, in this day and age.

Keep reading.

The Real Outrage Over James Comey's Firing

Heh.

A righteous piece, at NYT:

For Trump supporters, the real outrage is the left's outrage over Comey's firing https://t.co/fOI6ZSUEC5

— The New York Times (@nytimes) May 11, 2017

Fantasy of Impeachment

It's a good piece.

And keep in mind, I think Erick Erickson's a dork.

At NYT:

Op-Ed Contributor: Erick Erickson: The Fantasy of Impeachment. https://t.co/2gnpZmMT8x

— NYT (@NYT) May 13, 2017

PREVIOUSLY: "It's Not Watergate People. It's Just Fucking Not."

Amber Lee's Patchy Drizzle Forecast

It was wet out this morning when I took my son to school, and cool and cloudy for the rest of the day.

Looks like it's going to be very similar tomorrow.

Here's the fabulous Ms. Amber, for CBS News 2 Los Angeles:

Pat Buchanan, Nixon's White House Wars

*BUMPED.*

Great timing.

Just out this week, at Amazon, Pat Buchanan, Nixon's White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever.

WaPo's Crap Hit-Piece on 'Highly Classified' Intel is Fake News

It's trending at Memeorandum, "Trump revealed highly classified information to Russian foreign minister and ambassador."

Laura Ingraham's calling bull:

WH source with direct knowledge just told me @washingtonpost didn't talk to ANY U.S. official at mtg w/ Lavrov. "It's Fake News"

— Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) May 15, 2017

I read the piece. All sources are commenting on background. You can't corroborate the details, and as you can see, the White House is denying.

Former Olympic Medalist McKayla Maroney on Instagram

At the New York Post, "The side of McKayla Maroney you haven’t seen before."

Also, at IDLYITW, "Ok Then, McKayla Maroney."

GOOD GOD, MAN #MondayMorning https://t.co/jBDJxGCVeS

— IDLYITW (@IDLYITW) May 15, 2017

Shop Today

At Amazon, Today's Deals. New Deals. Every Day.

Also, Best Sellers in Televisions.

More, Deals in Laptops.

BONUS: Richard White, The Middle Ground: Indians, Empires, and Republics in the Great Lakes Region, 1650-1815.

Danielle Gersh's Fog and Drizzle Forecast

A very similar forecast to Jennifer Delacruz's for the metropolitan San Diego area.

It's going to be foggy and drizzly, and some part of the O.C. coast will be in the low 60s.

Here's the lovely Ms. Danielle, for CBS News 2 Los Angeles:

Why Women Live Longer Than Men

Freakin'-a no doubt!

Seen on Twitter:

As my wife says to me often, "this is why women live longer than men." https://t.co/VGF6F2qFoU

— Clay Routledge (@clayroutledge) May 1, 2017

Nope nope nope... 😳😳😳

Credit: https://t.co/l48z1cr3qj pic.twitter.com/3vVf6l7bdR

— SPORTbible (@sportbible) March 8, 2017

Our System of Checks and Balances is Under Assault' (VIDEO)

It's James Crapper, er, Clapper, from CNN yesterday.

And no, our system's not under assault --- not by President Trump at least. If there's an assault going on, it's seen in the left's war on our legitimately-elected government. It's seen in the left's revolutionary all-out war on our republic.

Watch, FWIW:

Meme War Veteran

Cool hat.

This hat is the most 2017 thing I have yet seen. #Berkeley pic.twitter.com/OVembg6Bma

— Alexander Nazaryan (@alexnazaryan) April 27, 2017

Michael Roberts, The Long Depression

A link for any dialectical readers.

At Amazon, The Long Depression: Marxism and the Global Crisis of Capitalism.

Emojicast

That's quite a twist on the weather, a hip twist, heh.

A change in our weather pattern after today.Trending cooler... especially next week. Rain chance late Thu & Fri #GMW pic.twitter.com/mEnsWp0duF

— Veronica Johnson (@VJohnsonABC7) May 2, 2017

Ruchir Sharma, The Rise and Fall of Nations

*BUMPED.*

At Amazon, Ruchir Sharma, The Rise and Fall of Nations: Forces of Change in the Post-Crisis World.

Jennifer Delacruz's Drizzly Forecast

It's going to be wet, gray, and cold tomorrow --- not all that unusual weather for mid-May, actually.

Following-up from a little while ago, "Jennifer Delacruz's Cool Cloudy Forecast."

Once more, here's the lovely Ms. Jennifer:

Samuel P. Huntington, Political Order in Changing Societies

I need to read a little more widely over the summer, especially among works in my field.

Here's Samuel Huntington, at Amazon, Political Order in Changing Societies.

Faith Hill

She's the sweetest thing ever.

Tulsa tonight! #Soul2Soul pic.twitter.com/KbKUwHlfK5

— Faith Hill (@FaithHill) May 11, 2017

The Frightful Five

This is pretty good, from Farhad Manjoo, at NYT.

The "frightful five" are Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, and Google. Which ones could you do without, from the easiest to the toughest? I'd ditch Facebook with no problems, lol. After that, though, it's not so easy to ditch any of these. We're not just talking about ditching one product, but the entire company. I like Microsoft Word, and at work I like Microsoft Outlook for email. And I'm on Apple all the time, since I have an iPhone, which I love. Amazon's mostly for books and stuff, but Google's my bread and butter. I blog on Google, email with gmail.com, and of course search Google exclusively. It'd be hard to give up. So, you get the picture. Manjoo would be bummed to bail out on Amazon, because he uses it for everything and has been since it first went online, which is interesting.

Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook and Google dominate our lives. What would happen if we had to give them up? https://t.co/Q5jJX0h9y7

— The New York Times (@nytimes) May 14, 2017

Mother's Day Brings Out the Worst

The worst in feminists, and leftists generally. What is so wrong with these people?

Good grief! I've had three kids and that didn't happen once. https://t.co/UGEihs31Bj

— Melissa Mackenzie 🌐 (@MelissaTweets) May 14, 2017

THE DAY I PEOPLE FOUND OUT I WAS PREGNANT WITH THING1 what was the day i ceased to be a person and became a vessel, a body without will

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

THAT DAY I CEASED TO BE A PROFESSOR & PROFESSIONAlL, that day i ceased to have 2 Masters & still debating to complete my PhD...

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

MY INTELLIGENCE
MY BRILLIANCE
MY TALENT
MY GALL
everything that could define my being, my brawn, disappeared in an ether of condescension

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

I WAS NOT TO BE TALKED TO
I WAS TO BE TALKED AT
i became the VERIFIED property of my spouse, carrier of his spawn, property of his tribe

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

and yet...
and yet...

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

MOTHERHOOD IN 'AMERICA'
Motherhood is an ideal they hold so high, so dear... it's more than an aspiration; it's a manifest destiny...

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

MOTHERS IN 'AMERICA'
as complete human beings expressed in all their complexities?... what do you mean mothers are people?!?

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

AMERICA
LOVES
THE IDEA OF
MOTHERHOOD
it hates,
nay,
it despises
MOTHERS
to the point of
denying our personhood
and our humanity

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

MOTHERS
shouldn't be paid for their mothering
MOTHERS
shouldn't get all the health care they need
MOTHERS
shouldn't be trusted with choices

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

IF USA REALLY LOVED MOTHERS, if this nation really loved not just mothers but all womb-carriers as PEOPLE, motherhood wouldn't be an ideal

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

IF USA REALLY LOVED MOTHERS AS PEOPLE we wouldn't have politicians giddy sending our babies to war

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

IF USA REALLY LOVED MOTHERS AS PEOPLE we wouldn't have 50 million applauding into the White House a guy who bragged about sexual assault

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

IF USA REALLY LOVED MOTHERS AS PEOPLE we would all have HEALTH CARE as the human right it is, regardless of employment or marital status

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

IF USA REALLY LOVED MOTHERS AS PEOPLE you wouldn't rant about stay-at-home moms as 'welfare queens' but ensured we all had a basic income

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

IF USA REALLY LOVED MOTHERS AS PEOPLE you wouldn't fight so hard to deny us & babies free health care, schooling, food, housing

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

IF USA REALLY LOVED MOTHERS AS PEOPLE y'all wouldn't spend energy insulting me onhere instead of pondering all the ways y'all mistreat us

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

IF USA REALLY LOVED MOTHERS AS PEOPLE you wouldn't belittle the labor of Mothering & penalize mothers in old age for those unemployed years

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

IF USA REALLY LOVED MOTHERS AS PEOPLE you would never confuse employment with labor and use that to deny mothers social services in old age

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

IF USA REALLY LOVED MOTHERS AS PEOPLE we mothers wouldn't have to defend our CHOICE of motherhood as proof of our will as free individuals

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

YET HERE WE ARE MOTHERING in spite of living in one of the most misogynist, woman-hating, feminine-loathing cultures in Human history

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

YET HERE WE ARE MOTHERING in spite of living in a country where it is still up to debate whether it's a choice to be or not to be a mom

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

TODAY IS MOTHERS' DAY but it would be every day Mothers' Day if we truly loved the people who become mothers and not just the idea

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

I AM NOT AN IDEA
i am a woman, a person, an individual, who loves being a mom to my kids and loves mothering everybody around me

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

MOTHERS AREN'T AN IDEA
we are beings in our complexities and contradictions. we are people. we are individuals. we have human rights too

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

MY LOVE & SOLIDARITY goes out to all the moms & mothering people out there struggling in spite of the odds against us. i hear you. i see you

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

AND TO THE TROLLS SWARMING THANKS TO @MelissaTweets' PRIVILEGED NAY-SAYING you are all exactly proving my point. thanks for playing.

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

ONE MORE POINT: if 'America' truly loved mothers, y'all would adore us BLACK MOTHERS and rebuked as terrorism this:pic.twitter.com/AvkZFkzYT9

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

YOU CANT CLAIM TO LOVE MOTHERS, then find excuses not to support black, indigenous, trans, latinx, immigrant, muslim, poor, working moms

— Liza Sabater 🇵🇷👸🏾 (@blogdiva) May 14, 2017

Jennifer Delacruz's Cool Cloudy Forecast

Here's the lovely Ms. Jennifer, for ABC News 10 San Diego.

I'll update if the network's got another video up of Ms. Jennifer later.

Sunday Cartoons

At Flopping Aces, "Sunday Funnies."

#Trump to Clean House? Who's next? #YoureFired #ComeyFiring #MAGA #BenGarrison #cartoons prints https://t.co/kkVVbMtLnA pic.twitter.com/ikrwn5vw44

— BenGarrison Cartoons (@GrrrGraphics) May 14, 2017

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

Shop Today's Deals

At Amazon, Today's Deals.

And see especially, Barska Optics and More.

More, Shop Canon Cameras.

Also, Banana Boat Ultra Mist Sport Performance Broad Spectrum Sun Care Sunscreen Spray - Twin Pack - SPF 30, 2 count, 6OZ.

Plus, Large Beach Towel, Pool Towel, in Cabana Stripe - (Variety, 4 pack, 30x60 inches) - Cotton - by Utopia Towel.

BONUS: Victor Davis Hanson, The Second World Wars: How the First Global Conflict Was Fought and Won.

Beate Muska Playboy Pictorial (VIDEO)

At Drunken Stepfather, "BEATE MUSKA NUDE OF THE DAY."

Kenza Fourati Takes It Off (VIDEO)

Following-up from last month, "Kenza Fourati Body Painting (VIDEO)."

Blonde Babe Shows Off Skimpy See-Through Bikini

At Sexy and Funny, "Hot Blonde Flaunts Bikini That's See-Through When Wet."

Lolz: Feminist Professor Caroline Heldman Weighs In on Firing of James Comey (VIDEO)

She's such an idiot.

Remember, from last month, "Professor Caroline Heldman Calls for 80 Percent Tax on the Rich (VIDEO)"?

Well, the far-left hypocrite's back, at CBS News 2 Los Angeles:

Uproar Over ABC's Cancellation of Conservative Tim Allen's Hit Show 'Last Man Standing'

Seriously. My wife and I love that show. It airs at 8:00pm on Friday nights, which is great. It comes on right after you've had dinner and had time to clean the kitchen. I always sit down to watch for a while, before going to my man cave for blogging and reading. And to think, "Last Man Standing" was having its best year in the ratings, its sixth season, and was averaging 8.1 million weekly viewers, behind only the leftist freak show "Modern Family."

Lame.

At Heat Street:

#ABC Besieged by Boycott Calls Over Cancellation of Conservative Tim Allen’s Show 'Last Man Standing': #BoycottABC https://t.co/XElPjFyYAB

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 13, 2017

San Carlos #KinderCare Cited for Numerous Violations (VIDEO)

My kid used to attend #KinderCare back in the day, in Fountain Valley and Irvine. It's such a nightmare sometimes. If you don't have family in the area, and you have a career --- as both my wife and I do --- it's a bummer to put your child in the hands of strangers. You have to be super vigilant. With luck, you'll wind up with excellent caregivers. We finally found a daycare center in Irvine with the owner who had her own special needs children, so she made sure our son got the attention he needed. But it takes a while until you can find the right place. This center in San Carlos should be shut down. Either that, or parents should bail out until it goes out of business.

At ABC News 10 San Diego:

Kristen Keogh's Mother's Day Forecast

The lovely Ms. Kristen's been away for a while.

At ABC News 10 San Diego:

Court Rules Kentucky Print Shop Has Right to Avoid Making Gay Pride T-shirts

Good.

Screw the homosexual Nazis.

At WSJ (via Memeorandum and Vox Populi):

Court Rules Kentucky Print Shop Has Right to Avoid Making Gay Pride Shirts... https://t.co/xEoLZoiPgp

— DRUDGE REPORT (@DRUDGE_REPORT) May 13, 2017

A Kentucky appellate court on Friday ruled that the Christian owner of a printing shop in Lexington had the right to refuse to make T-shirts promoting a local gay pride festival.

The dispute represents the latest court fight testing the limits of antidiscrimination protections for gays and lesbians following the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2015 landmark ruling legalizing gay marriage nationwide.

The cases have led to a number of state court rulings against Christian-owned businesses that refused to bake cakes, design floral arrangements or take portrait photographs for same-sex weddings.

The ruling by the Kentucky Court of Appeals favored the business owner. A crucial difference in this case was the expressive nature of the service denied: literally words on a shirt.

In a split vote, a three-judge panel concluded that the store, Hands on Originals, couldn’t be forced to print a message with which the owner disagreed.

The dispute started in 2012 when Gay and Lesbian Services Organization in Kentucky asked Hands on Originals to make T-shirts with the name and logo of a pride festival...

Flashback to the Weekly Standard, "You Will Be Assimilated":

You Will Be Assimilatedhttp://t.co/1gu8Ivan7U pic.twitter.com/dguZejRK72

— The Weekly Standard (@weeklystandard) June 26, 2015

Rush Limbaugh: 'I Wish People Would Take a Moment and Step Back, and Realize What an Epic Presidency This Is?' (AUDIO)

At RCP, "Limbaugh: Can We Take a Moment and Appreciate How Epic Trump Presidency Is?"

I wish people would take a moment to step back and realize what an epic presidency this is and realize we are never gonna see anything like this again our lifetimes, and we’ve never had it prior to this in my lifetime. I mean, normally we get idiots like Jimmy Carter, who do great damaging things. I mean, while Trump is doing all this, the country is vastly improving! As I have detailed today. Some of the core things that were destroying the guts of this country are being reversed. And it’s…

Trump and Russia, Nixon and Watergate

Following-up from yesterday, "It's Not Watergate People. It's Just Fucking Not."

Here's another good comparative piece, at USA Today.

It's not the same, people. Leftists have gone insane.

Trump and Russia, Nixon and Watergate: What's different? https://t.co/yF064I23yD (Photo: AP) pic.twitter.com/yGldO7N2Ru

— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) May 11, 2017

Chris Wallace's 'Must-Watch' Critique of Trump White House (VIDEO)

I don't know if it's "must watch," but it's interesting.

At Mediaite, "‘It Took My Breath Away’: Chris Wallace Offers Stunning, Must-Watch Critique of Trump White House."

'It Took My Breath Away': Chris Wallace Offers Stunning, Must-Watch Critique of Trump White House https://t.co/tBvkODvgcT (VIDEO) pic.twitter.com/qTzr5455AO

— Mediaite (@Mediaite) May 12, 2017

Remember, Chris Wallace is an establishment insider. He represents the "hard news" side of the Fox News bullpen. Indeed, expect to see more of this kind of harsh, critical anti-Trump commentary as the network attempts to restore its mojo following the relentless left-wing wave of diabolical lawfare.

More video, with Martha MacCallum, "Wallace: White House answers only raise more questions."

Belgium Shining Bright from Space

A great piece, which points out Belgium's environmental hypocrisy.

Beautiful photography too. Absolutely astonishing.

At NYT:

A Photo From Space Shows Belgium Shining Bright, and Social Media Lights Up. https://t.co/clqnd3Pe0b

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 12, 2017

James H. Merrell, Into the American Woods

*BUMPED.*

Merrell's a phenomenal scholar. Just absolutely outstanding.

Don't miss his work.

At Amazon, James H. Merrell, Into the American Woods: Negotiations on the Pennsylvania Frontier.

Kate Upton Feels Herself (VIDEO)

Via Theo Spark:

Verizon AT&T Chick Has a Great Rack

It's Milana Vayntrub, and she's hot.

At Celeb Jihad, "MILANA VAYNTRUB PARTYING WITH HER TITS OUT."

ADDED: At Playboy, "That Girl From the AT&T Commercials Looks Way Better When She's Not in Uniform." Also, at AdWeek, "How Milana Vayntrub Quickly Rose From Surprise Ad Star Into a Creative Force for Good."

It's Not Watergate People. It's Just Fucking Not

I found the comparisons amusing the other night. I'm finding them fucking infuriating now.

Far-left tool James Fallows blocked me eons ago on Twitter, or else I'd give him a piece of my mind. Here's his hacktastic hot-take today, via Memeorandum, "Five Reasons Why the Comey Affair Is Worse Than Watergate.

It's not worse people. It's not even close. Leftist hysteria is peaking, but we're not there yet. It's going to get worse. Progs will lose their minds, and publicly. There'll be violence.

I've seen a few good articles making reasonable comparisons, but so far this one's the best, and amazingly, it's at the left-wing BBC, "Comey sacking doesn't rise to Watergate levels" (via Instapundit):

How does the Saturday Night Massacre from Watergate compare to #Comey's termination?
https://t.co/f1lNpbcvhS

— BBC North America (@BBCNorthAmerica) May 11, 2017

The New York Times called for the president to leave office immediately, describing it as "the last great service" he could perform for the country.

The Washington Post demanded impeachment, followed by a Senate trial. Time magazine, deeming it necessary to publish its first-ever editorial, thundered: "The president should resign."

Outside the White House, protesters waved placards at passing motorists: "Honk for Impeachment." Even Washington's most influential columnist, Stewart Alsop, who was normally supportive of the president, called him an "ass." The president had lost his moral authority, argued his critics, and with it, his ability to govern. The country faced a constitutional crisis. The republic was imperilled.

Such was the feverish reaction to the events of 20 October, 1973, a date remembered in the national memory as the "Saturday Night Massacre" - a pivotal moment in the unfolding Watergate controversy.

With scandal engulfing the White House, Richard Nixon decided to fire Archibald Cox, the special prosecutor appointed to investigate "all offenses arising out of the 1972 election… involving the president, the White House staff or presidential appointments".

Nixon's Attorney General, Elliot Richardson, and his Deputy Attorney General, William Ruckelshaus, resigned rather than carry out the president's order. Eventually, the Solicitor General Robert Bork, who was third in command at the justice department, was prepared to fire Cox.

The White House announced the news at 20:22 that Saturday evening.

On Wednesday, almost as quickly as the news that he had been sacked as head of the FBI reached James Comey in Los Angeles, these two dramatic episodes were being described as historically analogous.

The president had fired the lead figure in an investigation into alleged wrongdoing by members of his own team.
The Nixonian parallels were obvious.

Roger Stone, a Trump associate who also worked in 1972 for the notorious Committee to Re-elect the President, told the New York Times: "Somewhere Dick Nixon is smiling."

The Nixon presidential library even trolled the White House on Twitter: "FUN FACT: President Nixon never fired the Director of the FBI #FBIDirector #notNixonian."

Democrats insinuated that Comey was fired for similar reasons to Cox, because he was closing in on the truth.

There were other resemblances, too. In the lead-up to the Saturday Night Massacre, the Nixon White House was still reeling from the resignation of the president's chief of staff, Bob Haldeman, a central figure in the Watergate scandal, just as the Trump administration continues to be buffeted by the swirl of controversy surrounding the forced departure of Gen Michael Flynn, his former National Security Adviser.

There's the suspicion now, as there was four decades ago, that an embattled White House has something to hide.
So is this truly a re-run of the events of 1973? Is the past repeating itself?

Even by the standards of the Nixon presidency, the autumn of 1973 was unusually chaotic...

Keep reading.

Shop Electronics, Computers, and Accessories

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Leftist Media Hysteria Over James Comey Firing (VIDEO)

A quick clip with from RCP, "Mollie Hemingway: Manner With Which Media Covering Comey Story Borderline Delusional."

And at Fox News, the inimitable Charles Krauthammer:

Thanks to the Reader Who Bought John Keegan's, The Face of Battle

Actually, thanks to all my readers for visiting the blog, reading my posts and sharing, and of course shopping through my Amazon links. I greatly appreciate it.

But here I wanted to give a shout out to my reader who picked up a copy of Keegan's, The Face of Battle: A Study of Agincourt, Waterloo, and the Somme. That's a classic book. It was cited in the footnotes of my scholarly readings in grad school, all the time. I had kind of a flashback moment seeing the title pop up in my associate's statistics page.

Thanks again!

Teaching Racism in K-12 Classrooms

From Matthew Vadum, at FrontPage Magazine, "Leftist educators are corrupting the young":

Teaching Racism in K-12 Classrooms @fpmaghttps://t.co/1s86edlNBO

— All American Girl (@AIIAmericanGirI) May 9, 2017

Teachers at Highlands Elementary, a school in Edina, Minnesota, are indoctrinating five-year-olds in order to radicalize them and encourage them to become activists obsessed with race.

Public school teachers across America already saturate students with information about racial injustice in America in a nonstop barrage of historic facts and ahistorical nonsense. And in the culture at large, the media, politicians, and the entertainment industry can’t stop talking about race. The last thing any young student in America needs is to be taught about is race. Race matters only to radicals.

Leftists believe you have to get ’em while they’re young and impressionable.

Marxist theorist Paolo Freire advocated in Pedagogy of the Oppressed, that schools be used to inculcate radical values in students so they become agents of social change. Freire held that the so-called dominant pedagogy “silences” poor and minority children and that there is no such thing as a neutral educational system.

Joining Freire in his desire to use the educational system to level institutions is unrepentant communist terrorist and education theorist Bill Ayers, who has long advocated poisoning the minds of the young so they can agitate to fundamentally transform American society.

“If we want change to come, we would do well not to look at the sites of power we have no access to; the White House, the Congress, the Pentagon,” he said in 2012. “We have absolute access to the community, the school, the neighborhood, the street, the classroom, the workplace, the shop, the farm.”

This brings us to Highlands Elementary, which is located in one of the most affluent cities in Minnesota. Its school district is among the best in the state, Daniel Lattier reports at Intellectual Takeout. Highlands students do well in standardized testing: more than 85 percent of its students are proficient in reading and math.

But racial and social justice indoctrination have found their way onto the Highlands curriculum over the past year, according to Lattier. The phenomenon is not limited to Highlands, he adds. “[A] large percentage of students in public schools today are being trained to view the world primarily through the lenses of race, class, and gender.”

Katie Mahoney, who took over as principal of Highlands last fall, is proud of the school’s “Melanin Project.” She tweeted April 26: “Kindergarten tackles the Melanin project! @edinaschools @LeslieStageberg[.]” (Leslie Stageberg is a teacher.)

A poster made of construction paper is shown that reads, "Stop thinking your skin color is better than anyone elses[sic]! Everyone is Special!"

This message in itself isn’t sinister. American children shouldn’t be taught skin color is a mark of superiority, inferiority, or of anything in particular.

But one has to question the appropriateness of getting intellectually, emotionally immature Kindergarteners thinking about skin color at all, before they know how to think critically.

Why the rush?

It is to soften young minds in order to make the indoctrination process easier throughout students’ time in school. If a young child is already self-righteously hyperventilating about race and supposed systemic racism in America, it makes that child more susceptible to other leftist ideas.

The Highlands Parent Teacher Organization (PTO) wasn’t lying when it stated in the banner photo of its Facebook page that “Highlands is Planting Seeds of Change.”

Something else about the Melanin Project is disturbing. Discussions of melanin have an ugly pedigree. Racists are particularly fascinated by melanin.

Radical activists use melanin for political purposes, spewing pseudoscientific nonsense to create the illusion that their warped ideas about race somehow have an empirical basis in science. Melanin itself, a blanket term for a group of pigments, is the primary determinant of human skin color. Ultraviolet radiation from the sun triggers a process by which an amino acid called tyrosine becomes melanin, which protects the skin from sun damage. The thinking is that over time the more a population is exposed to the sun, the more melanin is generated and the darker their skin.

Leonard Jeffries Jr., a black studies professor at the City College of New York, is an influential thinker on the black racist Left. This Afrocentrist academic embraces “melanin theory,” maintaining that melanin possesses supernatural powers and makes those who have large quantities of it smarter and stronger than those who don’t. Blacks are therefore, peaceful and compassionate “sun people,” and are culturally and racially superior to whites, the violent, cruel “ice people.” Melanin empowers black people to “negotiate the vibrations of the universe and to deal with the ultraviolet rays of the sun," Jeffries says.

This fetishizing of human anatomy is surprisingly commonplace on the Left. The low-rent James Baldwin wannabe, Ta-Nehisi Coates, now the toast of bicoastal elites and academics, talks about “black bodies” as objects worthy of veneration without regard to the individuals occupying them. His phraseology is now boilerplate among members of the violent, racist Black Lives Matter movement.

Highlands was recently awarded a grant that will allow fourth- and fifth-graders to take part in the Stages Theatre Company’s “Perspectives on Peace” (PoP) project, Lattier notes. PoP is run by Nikki Swoboda, “whose directorial credits include: “Virgin Territory,” which “tak[es] a hard look at the ‘ideals’ of virginity and how those are perceived in society”; and “Ball: A Musical Tribute to My Lost Testicle.”

PoP promotional material states that the project “illuminates current world events and broadens students’ attitudes toward tolerance, respect, understanding, and peace…” A promotional video for PoP that was linked to in an email sent to Highlands parents associates Black Lives Matter with “peace.”

At South View Middle School in Edina, older students are encouraged to get involved in something called Dare 2 Be Real. A presentation slide that begins with “Be The Change You Wish To See In The World! – Mahatma Gandhi” states [emphases in original]...

More.

Democrats' James Comey Hypocrisy (VIDEO)

From the RNC:

Sunny San Diego Morning

Lovely.

At the San Diego Union-Tribune:

While many toiled in the city some played on a sunny San Diego morning. pic.twitter.com/MrySmomBEz

— The Union-Tribune (@sdut) May 11, 2017

Xenia Deli Swimsuit on the Beach

At Drunken Stepfather, "SUGAR BABY XENIA DELI ON THE BEACH OF THE DAY."

BONUS: "Xenia Deli's Naked Beach Shoot from Last Year of the Day."

Instagram Models to Follow in 2017

At Egotastic!, "Boobtastic Instagram Models to Follow in 2017."

What is Socialism?

Following-up from Tuesday, "Victims of Communism Day."

From the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, an awesome video:

Director Laura Poitras Reveals 'Falling Out' with Julian Assange (VIDEO)

Via A.P.:

Jackie Johnson's Cooler Temperatures Forecast

It'll be cooler Thursday and Friday, and then back up into the 70s for the weekend.

I'm not complaining. It's been mild.

Here's the lovely Ms. Jackie, whose forecast I didn't get a chance to post last night, for CBS News 2 Los Angeles:

Krauthammer on Comey Firing and Leftist Backlash: 'Democrats Are Hypocrites from the Day of Their Birth. It's in Their DNA' (VIDEO)

Watch, from today's "all-star panel" on Fox News' Special Report with Bret Baier, "Trump defends firing Comey amid Democratic backlash."

Dems have been complaining for months & months about Dir. Comey. Now that he has been fired they PRETEND to be aggrieved. Phony hypocrites!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 10, 2017

Joanna Krupa Smoldering Instagram Throwback

At the Daily Express U.K., "Joanna Krupa puts on a very busty display as she goes TOPLESS in smoldering snap: JOANNA KRUPA gave her fans a treat as she shared a topless shot of herself on her Instagram page last night."

BONUS: At the Nip Slip, "Joanna Krupa in a Brown Dress!"

'Down So Long'

Some music, until tonight.

Enjoy the lovely Ms. Jewel, getting bluesy:

Anthony Summers, The Arrogance of Power

A timely read, and excellent too.

From Anthony Summers, at Amazon, The Arrogance of Power: The Secret World of Richard Nixon.

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Genevieve Morton Goes Completely Bare (VIDEO)

Via Theo Spark:

Actor Antonio Sabato, Jr., to Run for Congress

The conservative television star was supposedly blackballed from Hollywood after campaigning for President Trump's election last year, at the GOP convention.

He's a stud, and a solid bedrock conservative family man.

We need more guys like him in Congress:

The former “Melrose Place” actor could be the next celebrity headed to Washington https://t.co/0Co7uQGKJ4

— New York Post (@nypost) May 9, 2017

Constitutional Crisis?

Following-up, from the hyper-dramatic Morning Joe segment (whatever sells airtime, I guess), here's Elizabeth Price Foley, at Politico:

Is This a Constitutional Crisis? No. Next question? https://t.co/ipddJ1k2lh @instapundit

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 10, 2017

'Trump made the only legally correct call'
Elizabeth Price Foley is a professor of law at Florida International University.

The FBI director, like all other officers of the executive branch, is an at will employee, which means he can be fired at any time, at the sole discretion of the president. When the deputy attorney general concluded that Director Comey usurped the role of the Department of Justice in his decision not to recommend prosecution of Hillary Clinton, President Trump made the only legally correct call, to fire the director. The country deserves an FBI director who respects his limited role as an investigator, and whose reputation is not sullied by inappropriately political behavior. If there is any ongoing FBI investigation into any of Trump's associates, this investigation can and will continue unabated. This is far from a constitutional crisis--it is a confirmation that the Constitution is working exactly as it should.

It's not a constitutional crisis.

It's a partisan witch-hunt.

Democrats are corrupt, evil, and un-American. It's been six month since the election. There's no evidence of Russian collusion or hacking of our democracy. It's a partisan scam.

Just duck beneath all the bullshit flying today.

Olivia Culpo

Lovely.

Beautiful Olivia Culpo steps out in white dress and satin trench in NYC: https://t.co/auAqVpimYV

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 10, 2017

More Echoes of Watergate

Following-up from last night, at Morning Joe:

Melania's First 100 Days

Now that's a First Lady!

All the low-key stuff Melania Trump has done in her first 100 days: https://t.co/pQpJDmQSv1 (Photo: AP) pic.twitter.com/HWXOhOn9cM

— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) May 10, 2017

James Comey Headlines

It's not a "constitutional crisis." Democrats want to make it into one, but it's not.

Today you gotta just sit back and take cover while the partisan bilge flies.

Headlines:

Trump fires Comey as FBI director: A look at Wednesday's front page pic.twitter.com/6tvIdUxJpa

— Los Angeles Times (@latimes) May 10, 2017

On today's #frontpage: @FBI director #Comey's ouster stuns #Washington; #Colleges vexed by rise in #MentalHealth needs pic.twitter.com/740AIPv7t3

— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) May 10, 2017

The front page of The New York Times for Wednesday, May 10, 2017 pic.twitter.com/yPEiXwMXgl

— The New York Times (@nytimes) May 10, 2017

Echoes of Watergate

Huge headlines tonight, at the New York Times, via Memeorandum, "F.B.I. Director James Comey Is Fired by Trump," and "Live Updates and Reactions to F.B.I. Director Comey's Firing."

Plus, I love this, below. It reminds me of when I first started following politics. My first political science professor, Mr. McDonald at Saddleback College, was a old-school kinda guy who loved to talk about party machines and political scandals. We had to read two non-fiction books on politics for his course, and I read Teddy White, The Making of the President 1960, and Breach of Faith: The Fall of Richard Nixon.

Good times, heh.

Analysis: Trump fired the man who may have helped make him president — and the man who perhaps most threatened him https://t.co/QMle9SvrSI

— NYT Politics (@nytpolitics) May 10, 2017

Conservatives Need Deep Soul-Searching

From Daniel Horowitz, at Conservative Review, "After budget betrayal, conservatives need deep soul-searching":

Thursday, May 4, 2017, will go down as a watershed moment in political history. This day showed us the culmination of all of the vices of our 28-year addiction to the binary idolatry of politics. Under the false dichotomy of binary choices (“but you might get the Democrats”), we are left with a political system that looks like a bad unibrow. If we don’t engage in some serious introspection and forward-looking planning, there is essentially no purpose to continuing this red vs. blue game. We have reached the moment when, just like the Whigs in 1854, after they failed to stand for anything related to the issues of their time, a group of us will have to meet in a schoolhouse and chart a new course.

Speaking of binary choices, I began the day with the choice of watching C-Span 1, where House Republicans sounded like Democrats on health care and were making ObamaCare popular again, or watching C-Span 2 and seeing Senate Republicans extol the virtues of a Democrat budget while having full control over government. For my own blood pressure, I opted for neither.

The events of Thursday – betraying the ultimate promise to save a sixth of our economy and pass a Democrat budget, all with control of all three branches – is the 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act moment for the GOP. I am not comparing these issues to slavery, but the political dynamic is identical. At the time, the new Republicans recognized that the Whig Party was completely maladroit and failed to confront the consummate challenge of its time. That is the context from which the Republican Party was born. Yet we have now been keeping a comatose party afloat for 28 years – since the retirement of Reagan – longer than the entire shelf life of the Whig Party.

Too many people will get caught up in the minutiae of the politics, details, and process of the health care and budget bills. The reality is much broader. The party just doesn’t share our values. When a party has principles, it finds a way to win even when it has very little power. Thus the Democrats. When a party has no principles, it finds a way to lose, even with full control of government. Thus the Republicans...

Keep reading.

Carmen Goséy, 'Woke' Student Leader at University of Wisconsin-Madison, Attacks 'All White People' as 'Racist'

This is really something else.

I don't get too many students who are this hardcore on my campus. This chick's got it bad.

At the the University of Wisconsin-Madison's Daily Cardinal, "Outgoing ASM chair condemns university’s attitude toward students of color."

Former ASM Chair issued a letter to the campus community condemning UW-Madison's treatment of students of color. https://t.co/zTc44WQyzG pic.twitter.com/XB1s92ALrN

— The Daily Cardinal (@dailycardinal) May 4, 2017

And at the College Fix, "Head of UW-Madison student gov. leaves in a huff; blames racism, oppression."

Here's her farewell letter:

Dear Campus Community,

As I move on from the role as Chair of Student Council, I believe it is necessary to leave honestly. The University is on stolen, Ho-Chunk land, yet does little to recognize its historic significance. For the University to truly recognize this sacred land and its inhabitants it would have to acknowledge the resentment and oppression that people of color face every day. This institution perpetuates and suppresses the voices that are the most vulnerable. As Chair, I used to be hopeful. I used to be proud. I am no longer content with the University's action and active silencing of students of color on this campus. I ask people of color to reconsider your place at this institution. I ask parents of color to rethink sending your children to this institution.

This University lacks the capacity, courage, and integrity to protect communities of color. I have held one of the highest student positions on campus, and I was a token for white supremacists. In my first semester, I was ambitious to implement change and new initiatives surrounding diversity and inclusion. However, I found myself lost and defeated. I was operating in a white position as a person of color. Now I see that this University was not designed for the success of minority communities; it was designed for white students to learn about my oppression while not having to participate in dismantling it. I have struggled with the juxtaposition of my identity and representing a campus that does not look like me or remotely relate to my experience.

Racism is an institutionalized structure which is embedded in ASM and the University. Racism is a system designed to disadvantage people of color and create inequalities in each pocket os society. All white people are racist. Not only by upholding a system of disadvantage but being born into a conditioned environment where you are many steps ahead. Being a racist is not an option, it is a condition. However, being an anti-racist is a choice. A choice that white people will have to make which boils down to what they are willing to do to actively participate in deconstructing racism.

My last and final words call out an unfortunate reality; this institution does not care about people of color. This institution does care about people of color.

Sincerely,

Your woke, ratchet 23rd ASM Chair Carmen Goséy

Seriously, "woke."

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Steve Bannon and Julius Evola

At the time, a few weeks months ago, the progressive Twitter literati was all "lit" up about this piece, at NYT, "Steve Bannon Cited Italian Thinker Who Inspired Fascists":

Steve Bannon Cited Italian Thinker Who Inspired Fascists. @jasondhorowitz via @nytimes https://t.co/FaVVkYi6OT

— Michiko Kakutani (@michikokakutani) February 19, 2017

ROME — Those trying to divine the roots of Stephen K. Bannon’s dark and at times apocalyptic worldview have repeatedly combed over a speech that Mr. Bannon, President Trump’s ideological guru, made in 2014 to a Vatican conference, where he expounded on Islam, populism and capitalism.

But for all the examination of those remarks, a passing reference by Mr. Bannon to an esoteric Italian philosopher has gone little noticed, except perhaps by scholars and followers of the deeply taboo, Nazi-affiliated thinker, Julius Evola.

“The fact that Bannon even knows Evola is significant,” said Mark Sedgwick, a leading scholar of Traditionalists at Aarhus University in Denmark.

Evola, who died in 1974, wrote on everything from Eastern religions to the metaphysics of sex to alchemy. But he is best known as a leading proponent of Traditionalism, a worldview popular in far-right and alternative religious circles that believes progress and equality are poisonous illusions.

Evola became a darling of Italian Fascists, and Italy’s post-Fascist terrorists of the 1960s and 1970s looked to him as a spiritual and intellectual godfather.

They called themselves Children of the Sun after Evola’s vision of a bourgeoisie-smashing new order that he called the Solar Civilization. Today, the Greek neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn includes his works on its suggested reading list, and the leader of Jobbik, the Hungarian nationalist party, admires Evola and wrote an introduction to his works.

More important for the current American administration, Evola also caught on in the United States with leaders of the alt-right movement, which Mr. Bannon nurtured as the head of Breitbart News and then helped harness for Mr. Trump.

“Julius Evola is one of the most fascinating men of the 20th century,” said Richard Spencer, the white nationalist leader who is a top figure in the alt-right movement, which has attracted white supremacists, racists and anti-immigrant elements.

In the days after the election, Mr. Spencer led a Washington alt-right conference in chants of “Hail Trump!” But he also invoked Evola’s idea of a prehistoric and pre-Christian spirituality — referring to the awakening of whites, whom he called the Children of the Sun.

Mr. Spencer said “it means a tremendous amount” that Mr. Bannon was aware of Evola and other Traditionalist thinkers.

“Even if he hasn’t fully imbibed them and been changed by them, he is at least open to them,” he said. “He at least recognizes that they are there. That is a stark difference to the American conservative movement that either was ignorant of them or attempted to suppress them.”

Mr. Bannon, who did not return a request for comment for this article, is an avid and wide-ranging reader. He has spoken enthusiastically about everything from Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War” to “The Fourth Turning” by William Strauss and Neil Howe, which sees history in cycles of cataclysmic and order-obliterating change. His awareness of and reference to Evola in itself only reflects that reading. But some on the alt-right consider Mr. Bannon a door through which Evola’s ideas of a hierarchical society run by a spiritually superior caste can enter in a period of crisis.

“Evolists view his ship as coming in,” said Prof. Richard Drake at the University of Montana, who wrote about Evola in his book “The Revolutionary Mystique and Terrorism in Contemporary Italy.”

For some of them, it has been a long time coming.

“It’s the first time that an adviser to the American president knows Evola, or maybe has a Traditionalist formation,” said Gianfranco De Turris, an Evola biographer and apologist based in Rome who runs the Evola Foundation out of his apartment.

“If Bannon has these ideas, we have to see how he influences the politics of Trump,” he said...

You see, it's very important to document how Trump's key advisers may have been --- or may not have been --- influenced by esoteric fascist thinkers from the 1930s who nobody's even heard about. But when Obama spent a lifetime at the teat of the most radical Marxists, Weather Underground terrorists, and black liberation revolutionaries, to even raise concerns is "racist," gauche, and thus fundamentally lowbrow. You're clinging to guns and religion, bro.

This is why Trump won. And it's why Americans hate politics and the corrupt leftist media.

More (FWIW).

Brittany Pettibone

Following-up from yesterday, "Macron's Regime: So It Begins."

She traveled to France to cover the election --- in style, I might add.

Off to Paris for the French Election. May Le Pen be victorious! pic.twitter.com/eLnoKSkNmu

— Brittany Pettibone (@BrittPettibone) May 5, 2017

Why Macron Won

Here's NYT "voxsplaining" the French election:

Et voilà. MUST READ this very good @AdamNossiter analysis of why Emmanuel Macron won and Marine Le Pen lost. https://t.co/EPWo2V6ofz

— Rachel Donadio — NYT (@RachelDonadio) May 8, 2017

PARIS — The French presidential runoff transcended national politics. It was globalization against nationalism. It was the future versus the past. Open versus closed.

But in his resounding victory on Sunday night, Emmanuel Macron, the centrist who has never held elected office, won because he was the beneficiary of a uniquely French historic and cultural legacy, where many voters wanted change but were appalled at the type of populist anger that had upturned politics in Britain and the United States. He trounced the far-right candidate Marine Le Pen, keeping her well under 40 percent, even as her aides said before the vote that anything below that figure would be considered a failure.

His victory quickly brought joy from Europe’s political establishment, especially since a Le Pen victory would have plunged the European Union into crisis. But in the end, Mr. Macron, only 39, a former investment banker and an uninspired campaigner, won because of luck, an unexpected demonstration of political skill, and the ingrained fears and contempt that a majority of French still feel toward Ms. Le Pen and her party, the National Front.

For the past year, a pressing political question has been whether widespread public frustration against Western political establishments had morphed into a global populist movement. Britain’s vote to leave the European Union last June, followed by the presidential election of Donald J. Trump in the United States, created the impression of a mounting wave. Ms. Le Pen, stalwart of the European far right, was the next truly big test.

But Ms. Le Pen’s challenge was different because French history is different. She has spent the last six years as president of the National Front single-mindedly focused on one objective: erasing the stain of her party’s association with the ex-collaborationists, right-wing extremists, immigrant-hating racists and anti-Semites who founded it 45 years ago.

She knew — as her father, the party patriarch Jean-Marie Le Pen, always refused to acknowledge — that she would always be a minority candidate as long as she reminded the French of perhaps the greatest stain in their history, the four years of far-right rule during World War II. Inside and outside the party this process was called “undemonization” — a term suggesting the demons still associated with her party. The French do not want them back.

“There was no choice. I couldn’t vote for Le Pen. You’re not going to vote for the extremist,” said Martine Nurit, 52, a small-restaurant owner who had just cast her ballot in Paris’s 20th Arrondissement on Sunday. She had voted for the far-left candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon in the first round, on April 23, and it was with “not an ounce of joy” that she voted for the “business-oriented” Mr. Macron in the second.

“Mostly, I voted against Le Pen,” she said.

In the end Ms. Le Pen failed to “undemonize,” spectacularly. She failed during the course of the campaign, when her angry rallies drew the Front inexorably back into the swamp from which it had emerged. And then she failed decisively in one of the campaign’s critical moments, last week’s debate with Mr. Macron, when she effectively “redemonized” herself and the party, as many French commentators noted...

More.

You know, that's fair enough, as far as it goes. I wouldn't vote for a party that was essentially the Vichy warmed over. But that's not what the National Front is today. Alas, too late. The party's going to change its name, attempting to put its so-called collaborationist, right-wing extremist, immigrant-hating, and racist anti-Semitic history behind. At Politico:

National Front will change its name after Le Pen’s defeat https://t.co/psbUtUDRA4 pic.twitter.com/90v1Yh2aGj

— POLITICO Europe (@POLITICOEurope) May 7, 2017

Victims of Communism Day

Via David Horowitz, on Twitter:

Communist May Day - now a day of protest for progressive neo-communists. Here's an informed view: https://t.co/OtrmAzy3zr

— David Horowitz (@horowitz39) May 1, 2017

Uncensored Richard Nixon Interview with Pat Buchanan from 1982 (VIDEO)

This showed up in my featured recommendations, and it's worth a look.

Take the way-back machine to the early years of cable television, and I guess, the rehabilitation of Richard Nixon:

Pepe the Frog is Dead

Pepe is Dead. Long Live Pepe!

Heh.

At Althouse, "'Pepe the Frog is dead' — as depicted in the new comic strip by Matt Furie, the artist who originally drew the character."

I don't take this stuff too seriously, but apparently some people do, including the cartoonist who created Pepe.

At the BBC:

Pepe the Frog 'is killed off to avoid being a hate symbol' https://t.co/MONlOpnxZ3

— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) May 8, 2017

Kaloea Surfer Girls (VIDEO)

Via Theo Spark: