VLADIMIR PUTIN: North Korea crisis could be ‘impossible’ to solve.

Putin made the comments after meeting with South Korean President Moon Jae-in on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, Russia.

Putin repeated his assertion that sanctions won’t be enough to rein in North Korea, and cautioned against getting “emotional” over the issue and pushing the regime “into a corner.”

“We should be cold-blooded and we should avoid steps to escalate tension,” Putin said. “Without political and diplomatic levels, this situation will be very difficult to resolve and I think even impossible to do.”

The real problem is that China continues to spoil and overprotect its rotten child.

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ROLL CALL: Democratic Soul-Searching in One Pennsylvania House Race.

Democrats across the country are doing some soul-searching as Congress returns to the nation’s capital. The crowded Democratic primaries taking shape raise questions about whether more liberal candidates can win in Republican districts.

For a sense of how that battle for the party is playing out on the ground, look no further than Pennsylvania’s 7th District.

Democrats are targeting the bizarrely shaped district that includes suburbs and rural areas outside Philadelphia. Hillary Clinton carried the district by 2 points last fall, while GOP Rep. Patrick Meehan was winning re-election by 19 points.

Democrats see an opening here, especially with voters who are unhappy with President Donald Trump. But they’re battling over which candidate can best speak to those voters.

The Democratic primary field includes a liberal state senator, a former Capitol Hill staffer and community leader, a biomedical engineer, a real estate agent, an IT consultant, and a political outsider who has worked in education.

The important question is, do they support sanctuary cities, a $15 minimum wage, trans rights and reparations?

LIZ SHELD’S MORNING BRIEF: Hurricane DACA, the Iran Deal and Much, Much More.

MARC THIESSEN: Antifa are domestic terrorists. Meet their academic apologist.

There is no better example of an opponent of open-minded inquiry and robust debate than Mark Bray, a Dartmouth lecturer who has become the country’s leading academic apologist for antifa — a neo-Marxist movement that attacks peaceful protesters and uses violence to shut down free speech. Bray recently published a pro-antifa book, “Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook” (and to make his allegiance clear, he’s donating part of the proceeds to antifa groups). He openly defends antifa’s violent tactics, which he calls “both ethically justifiable and strategically effective.”

When Bray recently appeared on Meet the Press, moderator Chuck Todd told him “You seem to be a very small minority here who is defending the idea of violence,” Bray did not deny it.

Read the whole thing.

19TH CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: Yes, in North Carolina you can sue someone for having sex with your spouse.

OUCH: Utah Will Fork Over $10 Million to Cover Obamacare Insurer’s Debt.

THE TECH INDUSTRY’S CULTURE OF FEAR: Some Silicon Valley conservatives report being too afraid to use the industry’s products for political expression.

BRENDAN O’NEILL: This Isn’t Anti-Racism, It’s Middle-Class Misanthropy: “When is it okay for someone from a ‘solidly middle-class’ background, who was brought up by a mother who was ‘super successful’ at a ‘financial company’, to scoff at the homeless? To imply that it is they who are privileged? To remove the silver spoon from her mouth for five seconds and in her cut-glass tones declare: ‘You can be homeless and still have white privilege’? When that person is Munroe Bergdorf, the queer, trans model who was given the heave-ho by L’Oréal last week for saying all white people are racist.”

Plus: “And, more importantly, the worldview of so many who describe themselves as ‘progressive’ and ‘anti-racist’ these days. Something has gone horribly wrong with the once noble, optimistic, humanist goal of anti-racism. When I got involved in anti-racist activism in the early 1990s, it was about defending the ideals of universalism against the divisive logic of the state and establishment; against those who would have us believe that blacks and whites were fundamentally different and should therefore distrust each other. It was also about defending the equality of autonomy. It was an argument for the ability and right of ethnic minorities to navigate public life and work life, built on a conviction that they were as capable as any white person of doing so. Now, perversely, and depressingly, ‘anti-racism’ – those scare quotes really are necessary – means almost entirely the opposite.”

TONI AIRAKSINEN: Don’t View Obesity as a ‘Health Issue,’ Professors Say.

GOOGLE, ET AL.: Let’s Bust Some 21st Century Trusts.

HMM: Cornyn says Senate will add debt hike to Harvey aid.

DIVERSITY PROBLEM: The Lonely Lives of Silicon Valley Conservatives: At liberal tech companies, those who disagree on politics say they’re more isolated than ever before.

“Before it was, ‘I don’t agree with you,’ but now it has evolved into this new thing that is much more aggressive, ‘don’t even say something that is counter to what I believe,’” says Aaron Ginn, co-founder of Lincoln Network, which looks to connect conservative techies with government and political work.

Some fear losing their jobs while others worry they’ll be ostracized by colleagues. (That’s in a sector where 76 percent of technical jobs are held by men, and blacks and Latinos make up only 5 percent of the workforce.) Adding to the stress is Silicon Valley’s penchant for open floor plans, which make it hard to tune out an officemate on a rant, and the way companies encourage workers to socialize and bring their whole selves to their job. Several tech workers said they don’t post about politics on Facebook, where they’re friends with many coworkers. “My wife is very paranoid about me sharing my opinion, even on private WhatsApp groups with my friends,” said a former Amazon engineer who now works at Oracle. Most employees who spoke asked not to be identified because they worried about their job security.

Not only will this hurt recruitment and creativity, it will also — more significantly — add to the growing distrust that many Americans feel toward Silicon Valley.

APPARENTLY BEING YELLED AT LEAVES MEN LESS INCLINED TO INTIMACY.  THIS IS MY SHOCKED FACE:  The less I yell, the more sex I have.

WHO WOULD HAVE THUNK IT?   Proof that investigating Trump is starting to backfire for Democrats.

IT ALWAYS WAS KABUKI THEATER.  ILLEGAL ALIENS HAVE THE RIGHT TO LIFE LIBERTY AND THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS, NOT OUR TAX DOLLARS:  Obama’s #DACA: Hey, remember when it was temporary? [VIDEO]

HOPEFULLY THE MEDIA DOESN’T HAVE THE POWER TO SELL THIS POISON PILL:  A New Obama? The Media Starts Selling Abdul El-Sayed.

DON’T LET WEAPONIZED COMPASSION FOOL YOU:  Trump Rescinds Obama’s #DACA: Constitutionally It is Right Thing To Do [VIDEO].

YOU KNOW, IT’S TIME AND PAST TIME WE MADE UP LOLSJW MEMES:  You know all those cute pictures of cats with “invisible cheeseburger”?  Yeah.  Well, now:  Microaggressions, Invisibility and Reality.

 

THEY LIE.  THEY DON’T EVEN DO IT WELL:  Hurricanes, Nightclubs, and Logic Traps.

SURE GLAD YEARS OF EMPHASIZING WORK OVER MARRIAGE HAS LEFT WOMEN UNWORRIED ABOUT THEIR LOOKS: Fear of aging has women in their 20s stressing about wrinkles. Or, for those who need it spelled out, how social engineering fails yet again, and women are still women, with a side order of “in the new, vicious sexual marketplace, you can’t afford to let them see you wrinkle.

REAL HOUSEWIVES OF PYONGYANG:  North Korean defectors become reality TV stars in South Korea.

THESE ARE NOT NEWS I LIKE WAKING UP TO.  CAN’T I LEAVE THE COUNTRY FOR TWO WEEKS WITHOUT YOU GUYS LETTING IT ALL GO TO H*LL?   Millions of American lives could be at stake as North Korea threatens to attack power grid.

ASKING THE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS: Does a Modern Clone of the Microphone of the Beatles and Sinatra Belong in Your Home Studio?

Over at the PJ Lifestyle blog, I have a review of the Peluso 2247SE large diaphragm tube-based condenser microphone, inspired by the the classic Neumann/Telefunken U47 of Beatles, Sinatra and (more infamously) Frank Zappa fame.

(Bumped.)

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WELL, SHE’S NOT AS YOUNG AS SHE USED TO BE: Video: Andrea Mitchell seems very confused about immigration issues.

HAS THERE EVER BEEN A WHINIER LOSING PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE? Hillary: I Lost Because Bernie Promised Everyone a Pony.

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JOHN HINDERAKER: Harvey, Houston, and the Left.

T.C. LUOMA: The Kardashian Butt Must Go. Can we send the rest of the Kardashians, too? “Imagine if there were men who only trained one body part, like pecs or biceps, or men that never trained their legs and had disproportionately large upper bodies…okay, bad example.” Friends don’t let friends skip leg day.

THE 21st CENTURY ISN’T TURNING OUT THE WAY I HAD HOPED. The Rise of the Twitter Thread:

We don’t get to choose the literary genre of our epoch, and in this worst-of-times-worst-of-times political era, we have the Twitter thread. A series of tweets, written by one person and strung together by Twitter’s vertical border wall, the thread has emerged as this year’s ascendant form of argument: urgent, galloping, personality-driven and—depending on your view of the topic—either tacky and misleading or damned persuasive.

Umm, actually in the 21st century, we do get to choose whichever literary genre we wish to communicate through. Speaking of which, if only there was a medium that was extremely easy to get started in, and was so flexible, it didn’t limit its users to 140 characters. In fact, content could be any length – any style — its user desired. Sorry to blow your mind with those radical ideas; you may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one.

NO. NEXT QUESTION? Michael Ledeen: Is ‘Antifa’ Antifascist?

Earlier: Homeland Security Makes it Official: Antifa ‘Domestic Terrorists.’

HYPOCRITES: CNN TOUTS CLAIM DANA LOESCH THREATENED JOURNALISTS BY SAYING ‘WE’RE COMING FOR YOU:’ “While the group Digital Content Next decried Loesch’s phrase ‘[w]e’re coming for you’ as a trigger for violence, a quick Nexis search of CNN transcripts yielded numerous cases where CNN correspondents and guests used that same phrase about conservatives and Republicans.”

Perhaps the network that doxxes its viewers was simply having a massive case of projection.

OBAMA 2013: “You don’t like a particular policy or a particular president? . . . Go out there and win an election.”

Today: Obama Rips Trump Over DACA Decision.

Has there ever been an ex-President as whiny?

IT’S LIKE HUMAN HISTORY, REWRITTEN BY ROBERT E. HOWARD, to quote a Facebook friend. Deeper Than Deep: David Reich’s genetics lab unveils our prehistoric past.

This is not “ancient history,” which goes back a few thousand years to the dawn of writing. This is deeper in the past than “deep history,” which takes us even further back—before the invention of agriculture, before the invention of language, before the invention of the wheel.

This is deep, deep history, tens of thousands of years ago. When, it’s now emerging, hordes of humans, vast tribes of variations of hominids—Homo sapiens, Neanderthals, the newly discovered “Denisovans,” the mysterious “ghost populations”—ranged and thronged and clashed and bred and interbred (and probably exterminated large portions of each other) across vast landscapes that were battlefields and graveyards.

It’s deep, deep history that’s beginning to unscroll a vast pageant through the wonders of big data crunching and the analysis of ancient DNA samples from fragments of bone and mummies that have been rotting away in the dusty basements of museums.

And we’re just starting, though I hope the results are more reliable than Ancestry.com.

MY USA TODAY COLUMN: Hurricane Harvey revealed the awesome power of real America. “Across the affected area, Americans are coming together to help each other. Despite the racial divisions exacerbated by small numbers of fanatics on the left and right, (and amplified by the press), out in the real America white people, black people and Asians helped each other, men rescued women and children, and so on. The ‘Cajun Navy,’ which had so distinguished itself in response to flooding in Louisiana, took its boats to Texas and started saving people. . . . Some of the people helping were rich, others clearly were not. Likewise those they helped. The photos of rescuers and rescued show the kind of wide-ranging diversity that our colleges and corporations aspire to, but usually fail to deliver.”

A NEW OBAMA? THE MEDIA STARTS SELLING ABDUL EL-SAYED:

When he takes questions, one “clearly agitated man” asks him about sharia law. El-Sayed replies by saying that he supports separation of church and state and that he wouldn’t take away anyone else’s right to pray and wouldn’t want that right to be taken from him either. (He has made it clear that he prays several times a day.) For this, the audience gives him “an enormous round of applause” – even though El-Sayed’s answer is a total dodge.

Repeatedly, El-Sayed has described himself as a devout Muslim: he prays several times a day; he has said that “his Islamic values are at the center of his work as a civil servant;” his father is an imam. If he’s a devout Muslim, that means he firmly supports sharia law. But how does he square this with his purported approval of secular government? Is he a devout Muslim or a devout believer in the separation of religion and state? You can’t be both.

The subtext of this article implies that Obama was a crypto-Muslim while in office – which of course, based on his worldview, how he dealt with terrorism in America and with Iran, Iraq, and ISIS, is crazy talk. No, really…

TWO THINGS THAT AREN’T RELIABLE: DNA ANCESTRY TESTS, and this NYT article about DNA ancestry tests: “An earlier version of this article incorrectly described the family of Bob Hutchinson, who discovered relatives he did not know of following a DNA test. He has just one sibling, not two, and his mother had just one sibling, not two. The article also incorrectly described the person who began investigating the family’s history. It was Mr. Hutchinson’s sister-in-law, not his sister. In addition, the article misstated the results of the test. He was found to be one-eighth African American, not one-quarter, and to have some Swedish and Italian heritage, not none.”

INCONVENIENT: Al Gore Outsold On Kindle By An E-Book Debunking ‘An Inconvenient Sequel.’

(Via SDA.)

SO MUCH FOR THE LEFT PORTRAYING TRUMP AS A UNIQUELY VULGAR INDIVIDUAL: Chelsea Handler Jokes Trump has syphilis.

SCIENTIFIC FARMING: Netherlands is world number two in agricultural exports by using greenhouses and new technology.

STUDY: Lack of Access to Financial Services Exacerbates Racial Wealth Disparities.

Busette said that median accumulated wealth for white households in America is about $111,000, while African-American households have accumulated about $7,000. According to numbers released this year by the Economic Policy Institute, the gap is even wider, with median wealth for white households recorded at $134,230 and black households $11,030. Average wealth, according to EPI, is $678,737 versus $95,261.

EPI also broke down the wealth gap by distribution of college and graduate degrees. White college degree holders reported about $180,500 in median wealth accumulation versus $23,400 for African-Americans. For graduate degrees, the difference is $293,100 to $84,000.

“That gives you an idea of the disparity and why it’s so important to have folks included in the formal financial system,” Busette said.

Successful inclusion into a bourgeois institution like the financial system requires the adoption of bourgeois values and behaviors.

INDEED IT DOES: First Amendment Protects Cinema’s Right to Show Unicorn Masturbation Scene While Serving Alcohol, Says Judge.

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ED ROGERS: A 2020 Democratic agenda is emerging.

As I see it, the ante to be in the game as a serious contender for the Democratic nomination will include uniform positions on at least five issues. Specifically, any Democrat who wants to be taken seriously must support a single-payer health-care system, a $15 minimum wage, free college tuition, affirmative support for sanctuary cities along with minimal immigration controls and, finally, a contender must completely embrace Black Lives Matter and engage in a probing courtship with the radical pseudo-group the “antifa.”

The race to be the Democratic nominee for president in 2020 will be a race to the left. The Bernie Sanders agenda has taken root. By the time the Democrats’ nominating process was complete in 2016, Hillary Clinton had become Bernie Sanders-lite. I see the next Democratic nominee as likely to be Sanders on steroids.

That’s the ticket.

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MY USA TODAY COLUMN: Hurricane Harvey revealed the awesome power of real America. “Across the affected area, Americans are coming together to help each other. Despite the racial divisions exacerbated by small numbers of fanatics on the left and right, (and amplified by the press), out in the real America white people, black people and Asians helped each other, men rescued women and children, and so on. The ‘Cajun Navy,’ which had so distinguished itself in response to flooding in Louisiana, took its boats to Texas and started saving people. . . . Some of the people helping were rich, others clearly were not. Likewise those they helped. The photos of rescuers and rescued show the kind of wide-ranging diversity that our colleges and corporations aspire to, but usually fail to deliver.”

HMM: Buoyed by Gains Among Republicans, Union Approval at Highest Levels Since 2003.

More than 60 percent of American adults approve of labor unions, according to Gallup, which has measured the popularity of unions since 1936. The findings represented a resurgence for the labor movement after support dipped to 48 percent in 2009—the first time that union support dropped below 50 percent—though it still lags behind union approval over the last several decades.

“After plummeting in 2009, union approval remained lower than in its heyday but began climbing,” Gallup said.

Political partisanship plays a large role in shaping support for labor unions with Democrats, at 81 percent, about twice as likely as Republicans to support them. Republican support has risen from 26 percent in 2009 to 42 percent in 2017. Gallup said the election of Donald Trump may be responsible for the increase in popularity. Trump has made blue-collar job creation a top priority, championing manufacturing and infrastructure spending, as well as his opposition to free trade deals, a position he shares with unions.

To be fair, there’s not much left of unions in the private sector, and it’s a good bet that support for public sector unions is much lower.

HEADLINES YOU DON’T SEE EVERY DAY: Alligator found in New Jersey pool was part of rap video.

BOOM: South Korea’s defense minister suggests bringing back tactical U.S. nuclear weapons.

FASTER, PLEASE: Researchers build first functional vascularized lung scaffold.

ACTUALLY, THERE’S A LOT OF WIGGLE ROOM IN TODAY’S ANNOUNCEMENT: DACA Begins ‘Orderly, Lawful Wind-Down,’ with Current Applications Still Processed.

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UH-OH: North Korea threat prompts Japan evacuation preparations.

There are currently about 38,000 long-term Japanese residents in South Korea, as well as another 19,000 or so tourists and other short-term travelers. “If the U.S. decided on a military strike against the North, the Japanese government would start moving toward an evacuation on its own accord regardless of whether the American plans are public,” a Japanese government source said.

Tokyo is working on a four-tier emergency plan based on the severity of the situation: discouraging unessential travel to South Korea, discouraging all travel to South Korea, urging Japanese citizens there to evacuate, and finally, urging them to shelter in place.

Should skirmishes erupt between the two Koreas, for example, the Japanese government would discourage all new travel to South Korea. At the same time, it would urge citizens already there to evacuate using commercial flights. Although the Japanese Embassy would help secure airline reservations, the government’s role under this scenario would mainly be to provide information.

There’s a lot of commercial air traffic in the region, which would presumably all be grounded in the event of a military crisis. It’s also easy to imagine a mass exodus from Seoul, which is home to nearly half of the South’s 52 million people.

Foreign nationals in Korea had better have a plan in place, a backup plan, and a backup to the backup plan.

ANNALS OF PRIVATE SECTOR ACHIEVEMENT: The inside story of what it took to keep a Texas grocery chain running in the chaos of Hurricane Harvey.

One of my stores, we had 300 employees; 140 of them were displaced by the flooding. So how do you put your store back together quickly? We asked for volunteers in the rest of the company. We brought over 2,000 partners from Austin, San Antonio, the Rio Grande Valley. They hopped into cars and they just drove to Houston. They said, we’re here to help. It’s shitty work. For 18 hours a day, they’re going to help us restock and then they’ll go sleep on the couch at somebody’s house. . . .

Folks are volunteering to do it because they want to be part of the process. The last hurricane we had, Hurricane Ike in 2008, when it was all over, we asked folks: What can we do to thank you? They said: Can you make a pin that can we put onto our badge to commemorate that we were part of this? I said, I think we can make a pin. . . .

If you think about toilet paper, we’ve called Procter & Gamble and Kimberly-Clark, and we said: Send entire trailer loads directly to our stores. One store will take half a trailer, and the other store will take the other half. You can just bypass our warehouse, so you can just get it to us. In doing that, I create more capacity in my distribution chain. So, you send direct trucks — here are the stores you can go to — and split the truck: make it half paper towels and half toilet tissue. . . .

I do the commercials for H-E-B in Houston, so people know who I am. So, as I walked in the store, people would come up and hug me and thank us for making the effort to open because the Kroger across the street wasn’t open. The Walmart down the street wasn’t open. One woman walked up and started crying and she hugged me to thank us for being open.

You’re amazed at the innate good in people. People will rally to a cause to help out their fellow human beings. This time, maybe even more so than ever before.

Read the whole thing.

ANALYSIS: TRUE.

MARK RIPPETOE ON BARBELL TRAINING SIDE EFFECTS.

TRUE CONFESSIONS: I Was a Stay-at-Home Mom and Have Zero Regrets.

YEAH, IT’S NOT LIKE HER BLATANT COLLUSION WITH THE DNC TO RIG THE PRIMARIES DID ANY HARM: New Clinton book blasts Sanders for ‘lasting damage’ in 2016 race.

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HARDER, PLEASE: Merged Offline and Online Offensives Hit ISIS.

JUST NBC THE HYPOCRISY:

● Shot: “Former FEMA head Michael Brown remembers Hurricane Katrina ten years later, calling President George W. Bush’s decision to flyover New Orleans to view the aftermath and not land was a huge mistake.”

—Hardball with Chris Matthews, August 28, 2015.

● Chaser: “The hosts of MSNBC’s ‘Morning Joe’ mocked President Trump on Tuesday over a video of him helping load disaster relief supplies in Houston for Hurricane Harvey victims.”

—The Hill, today.

Related:

Just think of the media as Democrat operatives with bylines, and it all makes sense.

HURRICANE HARVEY: A View From A Rugged Communitarian. “The facts would tell you that Harvey was not a catastrophe for Houston; it was our finest hour. But the narrative spinners have an agenda: they want to assert that this event was an utter failure for Houston, and shame our city and county leadership into embracing centralized planning, and ultimately zoning. They believe in a top-down, expert-driven technocracy that rewards current real estate owners by actions that restrict new supply, raise property value (and therefore taxes), stifle opportunity and undermine human agency. As a life-long Houstonian, I would like to politely ask the narrative spinners to please pound sand. Peter Drucker once said that culture eats strategy for breakfast, and Houston’s culture is one of opportunity.”

Plus: “Houston was able to absorb the wettest storm on record with remarkably little loss of life and property also because of good engineering, informed by the experience of previous storms. A good engineer designs systems that won’t fail when hit with an expected event; a great engineer designs systems that fail gracefully and non-catastrophically when hit with an unexpected event. Hats off to our great engineers.”

A SIMPLE MISUNDERSTANDING? Ohio news photographer reportedly shot by deputy while setting up to take pictures of traffic stop.

He was rushed to Miami Valley Hospital for surgery and is expected to recover.

Grimm had left the newsroom around 10 p.m. on Monday to take pictures of a lightning storm, the paper said. While he was taking pictures, a traffic stop occurred on the same road, according to the article.

“I was going out to take pictures and I saw the traffic stop and I thought, ‘Hey, cool. I’ll get some pictures here.'” he told the newspaper. He said he pulled into a parking lot in full view of the deputy, got out of his Jeep and started setting up his tripod and camera. “I turned around toward the cars and then ‘pop, pop.”

The newspaper speculated that the deputy may have mistaken the camera for a weapon. Grimm said the deputy, identified in reports as Jake Shaw, gave him no warning.

“I was just doing my job,” he said. “I know Jake. I like Jake. I don’t want him to lose his job over this.”

That might be taking “high-trust society” a step too far.

EUROPE’S NEW LIE: Comparing Asylum Shelters to Nazi Concentration Camps.

Recently, Franco Berardi, the Italian author of a play in Germany, “Auschwitz on the Beach”, charged Europeans with setting up “concentration camps” on its territory. One line in the performance was, “Salt water has replaced Zyklon B” — a reference to the poison gas used by the Nazis in World War II to exterminate Jews. After protests from the Jewish community, the play was cancelled. Adam Szymczyk, the director of the Documenta exhibition, defined the show as a “warning against historical amnesia, a moral wake-up call, a call to collective action”. This response, while true for the mass-murder of Jews, is a grotesque distortion of what has been happening in Europe for the last three years. On the contrary, governments, non-governmental organizations, bureaucrats, charities and the media have all embraced migrants in the millions, and welcomed them with open arms. The Jews during the Second World War — most of whom were turned away, turned in or betrayed by all European governments — were not so fortunate.

The current misrepresentation was first formulated by Sweden’s deputy prime minister, Asa Romson. “We are turning the Mediterranean into the new Auschwitz”, she said. Since then, this sham comparison has entered into the European mainstream, and the death of six million Jews has been turned into an ideological platform — a parable of human suffering — to justify importing even more unknown migrants.

The question European voters must ask themselves is: Importing them to what purpose?

NEW FIRE REPORT: The vast majority of America’s top colleges deny students fair procedures when accused of serious campus misconduct.

RACHEL DICARLO CURRIE: In Defense of Bourgeois Culture—and Professor Amy Wax.

IN THE MAIL: From Eric Flint & Alistair Kimble, Iron Angels.

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MY USA TODAY COLUMN: Hurricane Harvey revealed the awesome power of real America. “Across the affected area, Americans are coming together to help each other. Despite the racial divisions exacerbated by small numbers of fanatics on the left and right, (and amplified by the press), out in the real America white people, black people and Asians helped each other, men rescued women and children, and so on. The ‘Cajun Navy,’ which had so distinguished itself in response to flooding in Louisiana, took its boats to Texas and started saving people. . . . Some of the people helping were rich, others clearly were not. Likewise those they helped. The photos of rescuers and rescued show the kind of wide-ranging diversity that our colleges and corporations aspire to, but usually fail to deliver.”

BRIDGET JOHNSON: Republican Congressman Determined to Protect DACA with House Discharge Petition.

TAXPROF: The IRS Scandal, Day 1580: Conservative Group Hoping For ‘Perp Walks’ After Breakthrough In IRS Lawsuit.

THIS IS WHY REPUBLICANS HOPE DEMOCRATS WILL DOUBLE DOWN: Exclusive: 77% demand end to ‘sanctuary cities’ for illegal immigrants.

PLEASED TO MEET YOU: This is the US military arsenal poised to WIPE OUT Kim’s threat.

A FIRST FOR KENYA, AND FOR AFRICA:

Kenya’s Supreme Court annulled Kenya’s presidential election results, mandating fresh elections in the next 60 days. No court on the continent has ever done such a thing. . . .

Jimmy Carter and John Kerry have some explaining to do. Who’s wrong, Kenya’s highest court, or foreign election monitors? And how much did fears of election-related violence play into the observers’ decision to brand the elections as “free and fair” when some on the observation teams may have had significant reservations? Did American favoritism for Kenyatta, who is seen to be more cooperative on business and security cooperation with the United States, play any role in the enthusiasm with which American observers approved the results?

The next 90 days will be extraordinarily messy.

It’s easy to forget that elections, in a way, are a simulated civil war. Without them, or without belief that they’re reasonably fair, you move quickly beyond simulation.

And, really, Carter ratified Hugo Chavez’s fraud. He’s utterly untrustworthy.

I WOULD CERTAINLY HOPE NOT: Has Iraq Stopped Cheating On The OPEC Deal?

HE MUST BE SILENCED. THIS THREATENS THE WHOLE FEEDLOT: Prof finds majority of minorities don’t face discrimination. “The study, led by Professor Brian Boutwell, consisted of reviewing response data from a survey of more than 14,000 Americans, finding that the vast majority claim to have ‘never’ or ‘rarely’ been a victim of discrimination. The results, relatively consistent across racial lines, found that only 25 percent of Americans responded ‘yes’ to ever experiencing discrimination. . . . Although racial minorities did comparatively report facing more discrimination, racial disparities were not nearly as high as expected, with only 31 percent of blacks reporting experiencing discrimination ‘sometimes’ or ‘often.’ Similarly, just 27 percent of Hispanics responded similarly, followed by 23 percent of whites, and 18 percent of Asians, according to the study.”

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MY USA TODAY COLUMN: Hurricane Harvey revealed the awesome power of real America. “Across the affected area, Americans are coming together to help each other. Despite the racial divisions exacerbated by small numbers of fanatics on the left and right, (and amplified by the press), out in the real America white people, black people and Asians helped each other, men rescued women and children, and so on. The ‘Cajun Navy,’ which had so distinguished itself in response to flooding in Louisiana, took its boats to Texas and started saving people. . . . Some of the people helping were rich, others clearly were not. Likewise those they helped. The photos of rescuers and rescued show the kind of wide-ranging diversity that our colleges and corporations aspire to, but usually fail to deliver.”

U.S. MARINE ROCKET ARTILLERY EXERCISE AT 29 PALMS: A Marine unit fires an M142 High-Mobility Artillery Rocket System — HIMARS in the lingo. The HIMARS is a cheaper and lighter version of the original MLRS (Multiple Launch Rocket System).

And speaking of lingo: you can pre-order the second edition of Embrace The Suck at Amazon. The new cover is perfect.

STEPHEN KRUISER: Canada Demanding U.S. End ‘Right to Work’ Laws as Part of NAFTA Renegotiation.

WEIRD HOW LITTLE PRESS ATTENTION THIS IS GETTING: Menendez corruption case puts other Democrats at legal risk, sidelines senator for trial.

CHANGE? Cuba opens 5-month transition likely to end Castro reign.

Over the rest of September, Cubans will meet in small groups to nominate municipal representatives, the first in a series of votes for local, provincial and, finally, national officials.

In the second electoral stage, a commission dominated by government-linked organizations will pick all the candidates for elections to provincial assemblies and Cuba’s national assembly.

The national assembly is expected to pick the president and members of the powerful Council of State by February. Castro has said he will leave the presidency by that date but he is expected to remain head of the Communist Party, giving him power that may be equal to or greater than the new president’s.

There’s even less change coming that that last line allows for, given that “the government does not allow the participation of parties other than the ruling Communist Party and has worked to quash the election of individual opposition candidates.”

If you like your Communism, you can keep your Communism — or else.

FOUR MYTHS ABOUT IMPEACHMENT:

Discussing the viability of launching a formal impeachment inquiry against President Donald Trump is like driving a racecar around a decaying track. The exercise is equal parts furious and tedious, sure to jolt over the same potholes again and again.

Good read.

I CAN REMEMBER WHEN STEREOTYPING WAS BAD: “John Legend’s searching for some folks who look like they love President Trump, and in his opinion … that means they should be old and overweight.”

Well, I guess these girls don’t count.

UPDATE: From the comments: “Are they also looking to cast a musician to play John Legend?”

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: MARK BAUERLEIN: GANGING UP.

Amy Wax, professor of law at the University of Pennsylvania and contributor to our magazine, has angered her law school colleagues. The statement they have written appeared in The Daily Pennsylvanian under the title “Open letter to the University of Pennsylvania community.”

The opening reads,

We write to condemn recent statements our colleague Amy Wax, the Robert Mundheim Professor of Law at Penn Law School, has made in popular media pieces.

The infinitive in this sentence is telling. Professor Wax has made some pointed remarks, but the 33 respondents don’t wish to disprove, dispute, or disagree with them. They condemn them. We know from the start, in other words, that we are not to witness an academic debate. The trial is over, the verdict is in. We are now in the sentencing phase. . . . If you read their brief statement in full—it’s only a few paragraphs long—you won’t find any disconfirming facts and exposures of invalidity. The authors of the letter don’t bother with refutation. The first and last aim is, as noted above, condemnation.

They don’t want to debate, because they know their ideas would lose. They want to silence their critics. Sometimes they succeed, but at the cost of looking both ridiculously self-important and childishly mean.

Honestly, if some evil genius of the right had invented a scheme to discredit academia, xe couldn’t have done better than academia has done itself.

And how ridiculous is it that half the faculty of an Ivy League law school couldn’t muster a single argument? Pretty damn ridiculous, but not, these days, especially surprising.

SINGLE PAYER, SINGLE SUPPORTER: 2020 Democratic Hopefuls Aren’t Backing Bernie Sanders’ Single Payer Bill.

California Democratic Sen. Kamala Harris is the only high-profile lawmaker to openly approve the plan. However, other Democrats and progressives alike have been slow to support the measure.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, and Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe haven’t spoken publicly about the proposed measure, and other high-profile Democrats like Sens. Chris Murphy, Sherrod Brown, and Kirsten Gillibrand have yet to announce their support as well.

Some, like Sen. Cory Booker seemed to believe that pursuing such a far-left idea in a Republican-controlled Congress was unlikely to actually pass. “I don’t know how we get it done in this environment,” a spokeswoman for Booker told The Hill.

Democrats are in the precarious position of needing to virtue-signal their support to Democratic primary voters, without poisoning their chances in the general election. Although to be fair, Democratic voters can be amazingly sympathetic (ahem) to candidates whose positions magically “evolve” leftward after they assume office.

YEAH, BUT UNDER OBAMA WE WERE CONSTANTLY REMINDED THAT THE CONSTITUTION WAS OVER 100 YEARS OLD: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Obama lawyer who worked on DACA admits it’s probably unconstitutional.

AN ISIS-AL QAEDA MERGER? The terrorist groups may be discussing a merger. But the author notes they hate each other — to the point of fighting a blood feud.

I’M NOT HAPPY: Hurricane Irma now at Category 5, with 175 mph winds. “Irma is now the strongest hurricane in the Atlantic since 2007.”

NOT DISRESPECTFUL, JUST HONEST: Turkey slams Germany’s ‘disrespectful messages’ about Erdogan, democratic values.

Ibrahim Kalin, spokesman for the Turkish presidency, said in a tweet Monday that Merkel and her Social Democratic Party rival were seeking to divert attention from urgent issues in their country and in Europe, such as a surge in discrimination and racism.

In Sunday’s debate, Schulz said he would seek to end long-running but currently stalled talks on Turkey joining the EU over what he perceived to be Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s increasingly authoritarian policies.

Merkel, who has previously expressed doubts about Turkey ever joining the EU, refused to commit firmly to the move, which would have to be agreed among EU members. She sharply criticized Erdogan’s rule, saying: “Turkey is departing from all democratic practices at breakneck speed.”

Turkey’s efforts to join the EU were probably doomed from the start. Kemal Ataturk had tried to instill enough Western values and habits to drag his people into modernity, but they never quite took.

OUTGOING OBAMA’S ADVICE TO INCOMING TRUMP: Do As I Say, Not As I Did.

“American leadership in this world really is indispensable. It’s up to us, through action and example, to sustain the international order that’s expanded steadily since the end of the Cold War, and upon which our own wealth and safety depend.”

No, seriously. He wrote that.

It is possible no other president in American history did more to stoke chaos and disorder in the world and less to “sustain order” than Barack “Red Line” Obama, who kicked off his presidency with the infamous apology tour. He abandoned Iraq, facilitating the rise of ISIS. He wrecked Libya and cowered in Syria — letting Russia step in. He backed down on missile defense for Eastern Europe and stood by as an emboldened Vladimir Putin invaded Crimea. He put Iran on the nuclear fast track, and impotently watched as North Korea honed its nuclear missile technology.

“We are just temporary occupants of this office. That makes us guardians of those democratic institutions and traditions — like rule of law, separation of powers, equal protection and civil liberties — that our forebears fought and bled for. Regardless of the push and pull of daily politics, it’s up to us to leave those instruments of our democracy at least as strong as we found them.”

Obama’s IRS persecuted conservative groups. He used intelligence agencies to investigate the media. There is increasing evidence that his Justice Department — at his guidance — snuffed an investigation into Hillary Clinton. And it now appears his administration actively spied on the Trump campaign, unmasking monitored conversations involving Trump associates.

Read the whole thing.

LIZ SHELD’S MORNING BRIEF: DACA Announcement, Hurricane Irma and Much, Much More.

A FRIEND WRITES ON FACEBOOK: “DACA was controversial because it was a reversal of existing law. Reversing reversals of the law is what Trump was elected for.”

DOV FISCHER: A Flawed President Whose Pugnacious Divisiveness Uniquely Suits the Moment’s Need.

NORTH KOREA “BEGGING FOR WAR”:

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said Monday that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is “begging for war,” and warned that the United States does not have unlimited patience.

“His abusive use of missiles and his nuclear threats show that he is begging for war,” Haley said. “War is never something the United States wants; we don’t want it now, but our country’s patience is not unlimited; we will defend our allies and our territory.”

North Korea may get what it wants. All options are on the table.

IT’S NOT REALLY A FAILURE IF IT GETS MORE DIVERSITY ADMINISTRATORS HIRED: Prof: Efforts to recruit women for STEM ‘may be backfiring.’ “Society keeps telling us that STEM fields are masculine fields, that we need to increase the participation of women in STEM fields, but that kind of sends a signal that it’s not a field for women, and it kind of works against keeping women in these fields.”

WELL, YES: Three Cheers for “Toxic Masculinity:” Houston wouldn’t be surviving without it.

SEVEN YEAR OLD BRITISH SCHOOL GIRL FINDS SWORD IN LAKE: Her name is Mathilda, not Arthur. But she found the sword in the same lake legend claims Lady of the Lake gave King Arthur his sword, Excalibur.

The article is fun.

IT’S NOT LIKE THEY DIDN’T WANT IT TO BE: Prof. W. Joseph Campbell: For the media, Harvey was no Katrina redux; here’s why.