Monthly Archives: April 2017
April 30, 2017 — Paul Mirengoff
Last week, President Trump issued an executive order directing Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos to determine which regulations and guidance documents issued by the U.S. Department of Education have unlawfully overreached on education policy to the detriment of state and local control. A Department of Education official said the order “puts an end to this overreach, ensuring that states and localities are free to make educational decisions” as required by
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April 30, 2017 — Paul Mirengoff
In my baseball history post yesterday, I mentioned two Kansas City pitchers with great nicknames: Jim “Catfish” Hunter and John “Blue Moon” Odom. If you got the impression that K.C. owner Charlie Finley liked pitchers with colorful nicknames, you are right. Hunter says “Catfish” was a nickname Finley bestowed on him. The pitcher recalled: [Finley] told me, “A player’s got to have a nickname,” and he asked me what I
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April 30, 2017 — Paul Mirengoff
Emmanuel Macron, the frontrunner in France’s presidential election hails from Amiens in the north of France. Amiens is a beautiful city (or was when I visited 15 years ago). Amiens Cathedral is generally considered one of the five most impressive in France. It didn’t disappoint me. But Amiens suffers from economic difficulties. For example, a troubled Whirlpool appliance factory plans to move its tumble-dryer production to Poland. More than 500
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April 30, 2017 — John Hinderaker
It’s happening all across the country, not just at bastions of photo-fascism like Berkeley and Middlebury. The University of Arkansas one of many recent instances. Wherever Democrats predominate, they enforce orthodoxy. I seriously believe they would shut us all up, if they could get away with it. The way Michael Ramirez portrays Berkeley goes for the entire Left. Click to enlarge: “Now I can sit down, relax, and burn a
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April 30, 2017 — Scott Johnson
Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein both spoke at the White House Correspondents Dinner last night. Time has posted their speeches in case you were otherwise occupied at the time. They had some advice for President Trump. In part they revisited past glories covering the Watergate scandal and taking down President Nixon. They have a few loose ends to tie up. For example, they still haven’t discovered what Nixon’s guys were
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April 30, 2017 — Steven Hayward
Here’s two minutes of 100 percent pure liberal narcissistic smugness on display, with Jake Tapper challenging “comedienne” Samantha Bee about whether she represents liberal smugness. Despite her bobbing and weaving—and especially the inadvertently revealing admission that “we make the show for ourselves and don’t really care what others think”—her answers amount to: Yes, we are totally smug. Please, please keep this up, and Trump will win 48 states in 2020.
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April 30, 2017 — Scott Johnson
Daryl Hall and John Oates are about to hit the road on tour with Tears for Fears (about whom I know nothing). The tour is making an early stop in St. Paul at the Xcel Center on May 11. I’ve had a late in life conversion to the gospel according to Hall & Oates since picking up on Hall’s Live from Daryl’s House series. Just for the fun of it,
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April 29, 2017 — Paul Mirengoff
To baseball fans of a certain age, 1967 will also be remembered for “The Impossible Dream” — the rise of the Boston Red Sox from ninth place in 1966 to first place the following season. In late April, though, I doubt anyone was having that dream. More likely, Boston’s most optimistic fans were just hoping to beat out the two doormat teams that had finished ahead of them in ’66
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April 29, 2017 — Paul Mirengoff
In a piece called “Why the Acosta nomination is very bad news for conservatives,” I wrote this about Alex Acosta, the then-nominee (since confirmed) for the job of Secretary of Labor: The Department of Labor plays a key role in areas of major interest to conservatives, especially immigration, wage and hour law, and civil rights. The left had its way, and then some, under Tom Perez, President Obama’s Labor Secretary.
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April 29, 2017 — John Hinderaker
Today–or tonight, as it was in London–heavyweights Wladimir Klitschko and Anthony Joshua combined for one of the greatest fights of modern times. Klitschko, at 41, is one of the great heavyweight champions. He held the undisputed title for nearly ten years, second only to Joe Louis. Klitschko came into the fight at 64-4. It is hard to root against Klitschko. He and his brother Vitali–also a former heavyweight champion–dominated the
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April 29, 2017 — John Hinderaker
The hundred-days idiocy will soon be behind us, to be followed by some other excuse for Trump-bashing. The whole thing is silly, but apparently inescapable, so it is worth noting that the progress President Trump and the Republican Congress have made in reducing government regulations is a more substantial positive achievement than anything Barack Obama accomplished in eight years, let alone 100 days. The regulations that Congress rolled back under
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April 29, 2017 — Scott Johnson
Hillary Clinton insisted on calling the FBI investigation into the private email system she established to conduct official business as Secretary of State a “security review.” She elaborated: “[T]here are lots of those that are conducted in our government all the time and you don’t hear about most of them.” Well, of course, as with all things Clintonian, the words are terms of art. It depends on the meaning of
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April 29, 2017 — Scott Johnson
USA Today rounded up a panel of observers to grade President Trump on his first 100 days in office. It’s a tough crowd. Five of the 10 contributors award Trump a D or lower. Glenn Reynolds stands out in the crowd. Glenn teaches law, presides over InstaPundit and writes a regular column for USA Today. He awards Trump an A+. Grade inflation has nothing to do with it. His case
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April 29, 2017 — Steven Hayward
Who had the worst week in America? It has to be Bill Nye, once the Science Guy but now the Weimar Guy, noted here a few days ago for celebrating the World’s Worst Music Video Ever. Shall we make him the new face of Nyehilism? Yes, I think we shall. Meanwhile, the Democratic Party and the campus left (but I repeat myself) continues its rapid descent into the abyss of
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April 28, 2017 — Paul Mirengoff
Anti-Israel groups on college campuses have come up with a new tactic in their effort to pass BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) resolutions. They are manipulating the voting to exclude Jews from the process. At Tufts, a group called Students for Justice in Palestine decided to place an anti-Israel divestment resolution on the school senate’s agenda on the evening before the Jewish holiday of Passover, at a time when many Jewish
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April 28, 2017 — Steven Hayward
Bret Stephens recently left the Wall Street Journal editorial page to become an op-ed columnist at the New York Times. According to some reports he left the Journal because his unrelenting anti-Trump columns were becoming unwelcome, as the Journal‘s editorial page is trying to take a neutral attitude toward Trump, supporting him when they can, and attacking him when he deserves it. I don’t know whether this is true or
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April 28, 2017 — John Hinderaker
This story hasn’t gotten anywhere near enough attention. Dr. John Christy and Dr. Roy Spencer are eminent climate scientists. They are realists who have done much to demolish the hysterical claims of the politically- and financially-motivated climate alarmists. Both Dr. Christy and Dr. Spencer teach at the University of Alabama Huntsville, where there was a left-wing “march for science” last Saturday. The march passed near by the National Space Science
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