A new efficient catalyst, from common elements. This could be useful in space, too, though platinum might be less rare there.
Nazis
Yes, sorry, but they really were socialists, and there is nothing “right wing” about them.
Related: Dinesh D’Souza apparently has a new book
Dinesh D’Souza explodes the Left’s big lie. He expertly exonerates President Trump and his supporters, then uncovers the Democratic Left’s long, cozy relationship with Nazism: how the racist and genocidal acts of early Democrats inspired Adolf Hitler’s campaign of death; how fascist philosophers influenced the great 20th century lions of the American Left; and how today’s anti-free speech, anti-capitalist, anti-religious liberty, pro-violence Democratic Party is a frightening simulacrum of the Nazi Party.
Yup.
Forfeiture
Why should it work in only one direction?
I’d ban “qualified immunity” — a creature of judicial activism with no basis in the Constitution — entirely. But short of that, it should never be available when police have failed to knock, announce themselves, and wait for the homeowner to answer the door.
And in the case of anyone who breaks down your door — whether in a police uniform or not — the presumption should be that you did the right thing by shooting them. Door-breakers should bear that risk. Likewise, if they shoot someone in the house, the presumption should be that they acted improperly.
Homeowners whose doors are broken down without good reason should be able to proceed against the assets of the law enforcement agency involved.
Yes. That’s the only way to end this lawless behavior.
Ivy League
I didn’t even take SAT in high school. I worked for a year after graduating, then went to community college, then transferred to Ann Arbor. It would never have occurred to me to do all the crazy things kids do to get into these overrated schools.
[Monday-morning update]
This seems related: Targeting “meritocracy.”
The real solution to this problem is the one none of the anti-meritocracy articles dare suggest: accept that education and merit are two different things!
I work with a lot of lower- and working-class patients, and one complaint I hear again and again is that their organization won’t promote them without a college degree. Some of them have been specifically told “You do great work, and we think you’d be a great candidate for a management position, but it’s our policy that we can’t promote someone to a manager unless they’ve gone to college”. Some of these people are too poor to afford to go to college. Others aren’t sure they could pass; maybe they have great people skills and great mechanical skills but subpar writing-term-paper skills. Though I’ve met the occasional one who goes to college and rises to great heights, usually they sit at the highest non-degree-requiring tier of their organization, doomed to perpetually clean up after the mistakes of their incompetent-but-degree-having managers. These people have loads of merit. In a meritocracy, they’d be up at the top, competing for CEO positions. In our society, they’re stuck.
The problem isn’t just getting into college. It’s that success in college only weakly correlates with success in the real world. I got into medical school because I got good grades in college; those good grades were in my major, philosophy. Someone else who was a slightly worse philosopher would never have made it to medical school; maybe they would have been a better doctor. Maybe someone who didn’t get the best grades in college has the right skills to be a nurse, or a firefighter, or a police officer. If so, we’ll never know; all three of those occupations are gradually shifting to acceptance conditional on college performance. Ulysses Grant graduated in the bottom half of his West Point class, but turned out to be the only guy capable of matching General Lee and winning the Civil War after a bunch of superficially better-credentialed generals failed. If there’s a modern Grant with poor grades but excellent real-world fighting ability, are we confident our modern educationocracy will find him? Are we confident it will even try?
I’m quite confident that it won’t. As Glenn often says, these people aren’t educated, or competent. They’re just credentialed. They’re the very opposite of elite.
[Bumped]
The Imran Awan Case
It needs a special counsel a thousand times more than Russiagate:
There are a lot of shoelaces to be tied up here. Among them:
Why did Debbie Wasserman Schultz keep this man in her employ right up until he was arrested Tuesday night when he has been under suspicion for months. Does he have something on her or other people?
Why did Nancy Pelosi lie when she said she never heard of Awan? Email revealed by Wikileaks says Awan had access to Pelosi’s iPad. (Wiklileaks has never been shown to be inaccurate.)
What is on the smashed hard drives Awan is trying to retrieve from the FBI? (Oh, those Democrats and their hard drives.)
Why is Awan suddenly being legally represented at the highest level by Clinton ultra-loyalist Chris Gowan — a fact-checker for Bill Clinton’s memoir of all things? (They are already using the same right-wing conspiracy baloney they used in the Lewinski case.) Does this make sense if Awan’s just a low-life fraudster? Why not let him dangle?
Just what is the relationship, if any, between the Awan case and the unsolved Seth Rich murder? Is it entirely an accident that Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s brother Steven is accused of blocking the investigation? Denials from Debbie aren’t worth much anymore.
Where did the Wikileaks come from anyway? Was it really Russia?
Funny thing, though, the alphabet news organizations don’t even seem to think this is a story.
[Update a few minutes later]
More links from Glenn.
[Update a few more minutes later]
Understanding the Awan connection:
Hezbollah aside, the danger posed by scandal-plagued, debt-ridden IT professionals on Capitol Hill is obvious, especially when (1) they have access to national security information and (2), if I may say so, when they are connected to Pakistan. It’s impossible not to wonder who may have received data the Awans had access to, especially given Pakistan’s history of collaborating with a various foreign countries and entities — including both friends and foes of America.
Finally, according to Raisley, Imran Awan had access to Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s iPad password. This probably means the brothers had direct access to DNC emails. Might they have sold them to Russians? Might they have sold them to non-Russians?
Clearly, I’ve entered the realm of speculation. But if the mainstream media is going to speculate endlessly about President Trump’s alleged collusion with Russia, shouldn’t it also be speculating about the Awan connection? And if Trump is to be investigated endlessly by the government, shouldn’t the Awan connection be investigated, as well?
So what’s keeping Sessions from assigning a special prosecutor? He hasn’t recused himself from this.
[Update a few more minutes later]
Total MSNBC and CNN blackout of the story continues.
[Sunday-morning update]
This is about a lot more than bank fraud. As Mark Steyn says, want to see real collusion with a hostile power? Because this is what it looks like. And just how bad is the rot at the FBI that they let all this go on for so long?
[Bumped]
[Update a few minutes later]
Roger Simon reviews all of the scandals:
Quite a litany, huh? Are all six connected? It’s hard to say at this time. Maybe all are or none are. I would imagine it’s some, if not all. But they’re all connected morally — plus beneath all this are the endless leaks, which I suppose could constitute a scandal of their own.
Now let’s play that game from Sesame Street — “One of these things is not like the others.” Yes, you got it. It’s number one. In that case, Republicans are under suspicion. In the other five, it’s the Democrats. And yet the only one under official investigation by Robert Mueller and crew is one. Something rotten in the state of…? You bet!
Yup. If Republicans were smart, they’d be screaming for investigation into all of this, beyond what Jim Jordan and a few others have been doing. But if Republican were smart, we wouldn’t be in this mess.
[Monday-morning update]
Let’s investigate all the scandals:
The House Republicans identify no fewer than 14 additional scandals or potential scandals that they want investigated by a second special counsel, Robert Mueller having shown himself to be a tool of the Democratic Party (my characterization, not theirs).
…At a time when the corruption of the Democratic Party stinks to high heaven, it is absurd that the “investigation” garnering nearly all the headlines relates to something that didn’t happen. It is time to fight fire with fire.
The House Republicans addressed their letter to Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. Sessions may or may not have been correct in recusing himself with regard to the investigation into the Trump campaign, but he certainly has no need to defer with regard to the appointment of a special counsel to investigate the fourteen additional subjects raised by the House Judiciary Committee members. He should appoint one or more additional special counsels to go after the Democrats. They should all be loyal Republican attack dogs. And when the dust has settled, the special counsel law should be repealed.
The Democrats have gotten away with (in some cases, literally) murder for decades, thanks to the Democrat operatives with bylines in the media.
[Bumped again]
[Update a while later]
Yes, Congress can, and should censure Debbie Wasserman Schultz. At a minimum.
Our Exes
Why we hate them so much after the breakup.
Huh. I don’t hate my ex, and (as far as I know) she doesn’t hate me. I’m very happy for her that she found someone who could make her happier than I could.
The Zumwalt
This is interesting. A proposal to convert it to a 21st-century pocket battleship.
Health Care
Yes, access to it is limited by overregulation:
The problem is that healthcare consumers have limited options. At the two ends of the spectrum, they can see a licensed doctor, or they can do it themselves. One option is extremely expensive, time-consuming, and reliable, and the other is free and still time-consuming but not as reliable. In between, there are few other choices. It’s possible to use a service like Teladoc or visit a drugstore clinic in some areas for minor issues like strep throat, an earache, or a sprained ankle, but in the absence of the current system of occupational licensing, there’d be a much broader continuum of possibilities between my unlettered amateur visits to Dr. Google and visits to an actual doctor’s office.
The problem is compounded by the fact that we pay for health-care via “insurance” coverage, which isn’t really insurance but just prepaid health-care. This system requires lots and lots of rules about what can and can’t be covered and what constitutes medicine. The entire healthcare market would function much more efficiently if there were more options. For treating a lot of conditions, you don’t need someone who went to four years of medical school and worked through a grueling residency. Better to save that talent for more challenging stuff and allow people to seek marginal improvements over DIY diagnosis.
But instead, we’re forced to buy “insurance” that isn’t really insurance, and they’ve totally destroyed the concept of insurance.
Cursive
I think it’s important that kids learn it, but honestly, if I had to write long hand, I wouldn’t write. I detest the drudgery of dragging a writing utensil across paper. Without a keyboard, I have no idea how I’d have gotten through life.
The Tea Party
Jim Antle says that the Republicans have repealed and replaced it. It was another victory for the statists.
Guess we need to primary some of them next year.
[Later-afternoon update]
Arizona resident Bob Zimmerman is less than impressed with his senior senator. Emphasis on the “senior.”