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NOVEMBER 28,  2016

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:05 P.M. ET: 

LITTLE MAN GROWS UP – FROM REUTERS:   OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will not attend the funeral of Fidel Castro, his office said on Monday, days after Trudeau's warm comments about the late Cuban leader sparked a backlash.  Trudeau referred on Saturday to Castro as a "remarkable leader" and expressed his sorrow at the death of "Cuba’s longest serving president."  Trudeau acknowledged on Sunday that Castro had been a dictator as political opponents called on him to boycott the funeral.  Outrage and mockery about Trudeau's fond words for Castro, who had been an honorary pallbearer at the funeral in 2000 of Trudeau's father, former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, has threatened to end the Liberal leader's long honeymoon.  Noting the "many questions" about whether Trudeau would attend the funeral, spokeswoman Andree-Lyne Halle said in an email the prime minister would skip the event.  "His schedule doesn't permit it," she said.  Neither does his political survival.

OBAMACARE FOE FOR HHS – FROM CNN MONEY:   President-elect Donald Trump has selected Georgia Representative Tom Price, an ardent critic of Obamacare, to head the Department of Health and Human Services, according to an official briefed on the decision.  The official announcement will likely come Tuesday.  One of Price's top priorities as health secretary will be to dismantle the sweeping health reform law that his two predecessors spent six years implementing.  Price, an orthopedic surgeon who chairs the House Budget Committee, has long decried Obamacare as a threat to quality and affordable health care.  "The purpose of health reform should be to advance accessibility, affordability, quality, responsiveness, and innovation," the Republican congressman said in 2011, a year after Obamacare was signed into law. "None of these are improved" by the Affordable Care Act, he added.  If Ben Carson takes HUD, there will be two physicians in the Cabinet.  I believe that would be a first.

TERROR AT OHIO STATE – FROM NBC NEWS:    An Ohio State University student posted a rant shortly before he plowed a car into a campus crowd and stabbed people with a butcher knife in an ambush that ended when a police officer shot him dead, a law enforcement official said.  Abdul Razak Ali Artan, 18, wrote on what appears to be his Facebook page that he had reached a "boiling point," made a reference to "lone wolf attacks" and cited radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki.  "America! Stop interfering with other countries, especially Muslim Ummah [community]. We are not weak. We are not weak, remember that," the post said.  Two hours before that, a cryptic post on the page said: "Forgive and forget. Love."  Officials cautioned that they have not determined a motive for the ambush, which sent 11 people to the hospital Monday morning. A senior law enforcement official told NBC News that investigators are trying to determine whether Artan had personal problems or something else that might have pushed him over the edge.  Islamist extremist?  What Islamist extremist?  Why, he's just a troubled youth.  Maybe he was pushed over the edge by those "salute to Israel" parades.  We must understand.

November 28, 2016       Permalink

STUNNING – AT 10:28 A.M. ET:   It is sometimes difficult to comprehend what has just happened to the Democratic Party, once the party of Roosevelt, Truman, and Kennedy.  The great Andrew Malcolm lays it on the line for McClatchy: 

How quickly times change in this remarkable year. In early November, much of the public discussion was hand-wringing over how divided Republicans would have to rebuild their shattered party after the crushing disaster of Donald Trump’s almost certain Nov. 8 defeat.

Turns out, at the end of November the reconstruction recriminations, struggles and talking points are on the other party’s teleprompter. It’s the GOP’s time for change to believe in. Will those hopes be fulfilled, especially regarding the Supreme Court?

In addition to the White House and both houses of Congress, the GOP will soon control 34 governorships and more state legislative seats than in its entire 162-year history. Not to mention, the all-important presidential bully pulpit, which Trump is already using eight weeks before his inauguration.

The Democratic Party, those scattered dots of blue mostly along the coasts, is in political reality no longer a national party. Its Rust Belt loyalists abandoned the status quo, leftist campaign of Hillary Clinton, whether in disgust over her scandals, the party’s direction or Barack Obama’s empty economic leadership. Or maybe they fell for the blow-up-the-Washington establishment appeal of Trump.

And...

So far, Trump’s skilled arrangement of meetings and choreographed leaks present the image of a thoughtful chief executive reaching out to unite his party, to build strong ties to Congress and to assemble a smart administration in the short two months available to him. We should hear much more of his appointments before the holidays.

Not coincidentally, Trump’s improved behavior also allowed considerable public focus to fall on Democrats wallowing in the understandable self-doubt and recriminations of their historic upset and defeats up and down the ballot.

Will Trump remain disciplined under Oval Office pressures? Will Washington’s Republicans deliver sufficient change soon enough to assuage angry voters who gave them full control after six years of government gridlock? And will this enable the historically minority party of Lincoln to construct a new, enduring coalition of conservatives, independents and deserting Democrats?

That’s the key to watch these next two years.

COMMENT:  The great gift to Trump is the divided, bitter, and clueless Democratic Party.  It's as bad as it was when it nominated George McGovern in 1972, at a convention dominated by the aroma of marijuana.  And I'm not really encouraged about the future of that party.  The left wing, with its identity politics and informal ethnic quotas, may have become too powerful to allow for reform.  I would not be shocked if a third party is started by former Democrats and moderate Republicans.

November 28, 2016       Permalink

COMEBACK? – AT 9:46 A.M. ET:  Americans love a good comeback story.  They may get one with the Trump administration.  From Bloomberg:

President-elect Donald Trump is considering retired General David Petraeus to be secretary of state and plans to meet with the former CIA director Monday in New York, according to a senior official with the transition.

The celebrated four-star general, who left government under a cloud for sharing classified documents during an extramarital affair, is meeting with the president-elect amid infighting among Trump’s advisers about who to pick for the post. The possibility that Trump might instead tap former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney for the post has fueled an extraordinary public lobbying campaign against him.

Kellyanne Conway, who managed Trump’s campaign and is now a senior adviser to his transition, said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that she is “just astonished at the breathtaking volume and intensity of blow-back that I see” toward the possibility of Romney serving as the nation’s top diplomat.

“In the last four years, I mean, has he been around the globe doing something on behalf of the U.S. of which we’re unaware? Did he go and intervene in Syria where they’re having a massive humanitarian crisis?” she asked on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “Has he been helpful to Mr. Netanyahu?” she asked, referring to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

If Petraeus wins Senate confirmation, it will represent one of Trump’s boldest appointments and a remarkable comeback for the 64-year-old general who won acclaim overseeing military operations in Afghanistan and Iran before serving as director of the Central Intelligence Agency under President Barack Obama. The Senate voted 94-0 to confirm him for that post.

COMMENT:  Well, Winston Churchill made a spectacular comeback in 1940, after years in the political wilderness, and led Britain during its "finest hour."  Maybe the same fate is in store for Petraeus.  His "mistake" was serious, though, and he will be forced to discuss it publicly should he be tapped.

November 28, 2016       Permalink

THE PRESS AND MR. TRUMP – AT 9:08 A.M. ET:  It is not a happy marriage, nor will it ever be.  Mr. Trump won a presidential election by tapping into the real concerns of actual voters.  The press doesn't know the country in which Mr. Trump won that election.

Ari Fleischer, who was President George W. Bush's press secretary, has written a superb piece on the relationship between press and president.  From The Wall Street Journal: 

It isn’t only Trump who is complaining. A September Gallup poll showed that trust and confidence in the mass media “to report the news fully, accurately and fairly” had dropped to its lowest level in Gallup polling history. An October Pew poll showed that only 5% of the public report they have a “great deal” of confidence in the news media, while 61% have “no confidence” or “not much confidence,” a level surpassed only by the low regard the public has for elected officials.

Reporters are aware of these surveys, but they don’t change. They remain mostly liberal and largely made up of the same elites who couldn’t imagine Mr. Trump winning the nomination, let alone the presidency. Too many live in a bubble in which they talk mainly to similar-minded journalists. They fail to understand that the combination of ideological bias and the loss of public confidence makes them vulnerable to the changes President Trump might seek.

In every era, the nation needs a fair and vigilant press to check the power of the president. Presidents might not like it, but it serves the country well. The daily briefing by the press secretary has long been a TV show, not a serious briefing, but it is still worth the effort. The mainstream media have a role to play, and so do a lot of other outlets. But when the press is too liberal or unfair, the media themselves put what they do at risk.

I don’t know what changes President-elect Trump will make, but he has extraordinary latitude. If he decides to go around the press entirely, abolish the daily briefing, give seats to different reporters, appoint a combative press secretary, or not take a press pool with him to dinner, the reason he’ll be able to get away with it is because the mainstream media lost the trust of the American people.

COMMENT:  And I'm afraid the process of losing that trust began decades ago, perhaps in the rice paddies of Vietnam, where certain American reporters, fresh with their Ivy League degrees, announced, in their brilliance, that Americans were really the bad guys. 

Read Ari Fleischer's whole piece.  Well worth reading and sending around.

November 28,  2016     Permalink

NOVEMBER 27,  2016

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:54 P.M. ET:

VETS TAKE ON THE ACADEMIC LEFT – FROM WWLP.COM:    Amherst, Mass. (WWLP) – At least one thousand veterans gathered in Amherst this afternoon to protest the removal of the American flag at Hampshire College. 22news spoke to protesters about why they strongly disagreed with the college’s decision.  Freedom is not free. That’s the lesson that hundreds of veterans, their families and friends and other local residents hoped to teach students at Hampshire College Sunday afternoon.  Jerry Maguire, Veteran said, “They took down my flag, they have a right to that, I’m here to defend their right to do that but I want them to understand how bad that hurts me.”  Hundreds gathered to show their support of the American flag and what it stands for after the College removed the flag on campus earlier this week following the presidential election results. A decision by the college that outraged many.   Hampshire is one of the most left-wing colleges in the country.  I'm glad the vets took them on. 

BRITS UPPING ANTI-TERROR OPERATIONS – FROM SKY NEWS:   Anti-terrorism police patrol units are hitting the streets of London in an attempt to spot people carrying out "hostile reconnaissance" and other criminal activity.  Lambeth and Wandsworth will be the first areas to see the new patrol units of uniformed and undercover officers from today, and are due to be extended to other boroughs in the coming months.  Scotland Yard stressed the move was "not in response to a specific threat".  Operation Servator, as it is known, is a tactic of policing already used by other forces including City of London and British Transport Police.  There are repeated warnings that ISIS will soon strike in Europe and Britain.  France last week arrested a group of ISIS plotters who were preparing an attack in France. 

ANOTHER DISPLAY OF COMMON-SENSE AMERICANISM – FROM DAILY CALLER:   Miami Dolphins fans mercilessly booed San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick Sunday afternoon in Miami.  Kaepernick has been in the news recently after a tense exchange over the merits of recently deceased Cuban dictator Fidel Castro with a local Florida reporter. Miami, which has a large Cuban population, didn’t let Kaepernick forget about it.  As he took the field the stadium broke out into an insane amount of booing.  I generally don't like booing, but it was justified this time.  Kaepernick goes out of his way to offend, and a little razzing won't hurt him.  He's a pathetic fool who really believes Fidel Castro was a man of the people.

November 27, 2016       Permalink

WHAT IS THAT RECOUNT ABOUT? – AT 12:32 P.M. ET:   Wisconsin, at the urging and with the financial support of Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein, is about to recount its presidential ballots.  But why?  There doesn't seem to be much of a problem at all.  From the Washington Times: 

he Wisconsin Elections Commission has found no evidence that any of its voting machines were hacked during the Nov. 8 election, a spokesman said Saturday.

Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein on Friday filed a petition to have a state recount on the sole grounds that data experts believe there may have been a cyberattack. They have no evidence, but contend that Democrat Hillary Clinton performed better where paper ballots, rather than electronic ones were used.

The Washington Times asked commission spokesman Reid Magney if there has been any indication of hacking.

“No evidence of hacking,” Mr. Magney said in an email.

The commission previously issued a statement saying it will routinely audit the performance of a sample of machines, which must achieve a performance rate of no more than one mistake per 500,000 votes. Since performing the audit beginning in 2006, not one machine has failed, the commission said.

Ms. Stein is raising a huge sum, heading toward $7 million, to pay for recounts in three battleground states where Republican Donald Trump scored upsets and won the presidency –– Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.

COMMENT:  It's very strange, but there are some new theories coming forward about the possible real purpose of this recount madness.  We'll discuss them during the week as more facts are known. 

November 27, 2016       Permalink

THE IRAN "RADIOACTIVE DEVICE" STORY – AT 11:52 A.M. ET:  This updates the second item in our "Short Takes" of last night.  It is turning into a significant source of concern.  From the Jerusalem Post: 

Radioactive material produced at Iran's Bushehr Nuclear Plant has reportedly been stolen raising concerns about the potential use of a so-called dirty bomb in the future, according to London-based Arabic language newspaper Asharq al-Awsat.

The missing material, Iridium-192, was reported to the International Atomic Energy Agency by Iran's nuclear regulatory body earlier this month, who warned neighboring Gulf States of its possible nefarious use.

A so-called dirty bomb, or radiological dispersion device, is a conventional weapon equipped with nuclear material. The idea behind a dirty bomb is to blast radioactive material, such as powder or pellets, into the area around an explosion.

Citing Saudi intelligence sources, Asharq al-Awsat reported Friday that the Iridium-192 was stolen as it was being transported from the Bushehr facility. The vehicle carrying the nuclear material was later found abandoned with its contents seized.

It remains unclear who stole the nuclear material and for what purpose.

The IAEA defines Iridium-192, a highly unstable isotope which emits both electrons and gamma-rays, as a category-2 radioactive substance. Substances with a category-2 classification can permanently injure or even kill a human being if exposed to the material within hours or days.

Iridium-192 is generally used for industrial reasons, utilized to locate flaws in metal components, despite the danger it poses to humans.

COMMENT:  Obviously, a significant story.  We'll follow it and see if there's anything definitive to report.

November 27, 2016       Permalink

OH JUSTIN, YOU DAMNED FOOL – AT 11:16 A.M.   The boy prime minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau, is in serious hot water over his adolescent-level praise of Fidel Castro.   He deserves the heat, and has revealed himself as the amateur that he is.  From CBC:

The prime minister is facing criticism for his statement expressing "deep sorrow" about the death of the controversial former Cuban president Fidel Castro.

Justin Trudeau posted a written statement early Saturday after the late-night announcement that Castro had died at the age of 90.

Trudeau remembered the late president as a "legendary revolutionary and orator," and said he was a good friend of his father's.

But others in Canada were less generous in their description of the controversial leader.

Opposition leader Rona Ambrose said in a written statement that under Castro's rule, thousands of people were impoverished, imprisoned and executed.

"My thoughts and prayers are with the people of Cuba who continue to endure his long and oppressive regime, even after his death," she wrote.

And...

And many people — particularly members of the Conservative Party — are condemning the prime minister's statement, pointing out human rights violations during Castro's half-century regime.

Conservative leadership hopeful Lisa Raitt wrote on Facebook that Trudeau should be ashamed of himself after his remarks.

"With those words, Justin Trudeau has placed himself on the wrong side of history — against the millions of Cubans yearning for freedom. The Prime Minister should be ashamed of himself. He must retract this statement and apologize," she wrote.

COMMENT:  Trudeau, like Obama, tried to present himself as a kind of modern pragmatist during his election campaign, but eventually the truth comes out.  He is the son of hard-partying Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, anti-American and pro-Castro, and I don't think the apple has fallen far from the tree.

November 27,  2016     Permalink