If only we could figure out the mysterious relationship between "price" and "demand."

Of course, our incompetent elites have totally figured out the relationship between "moral posturing" and "feeling good."

//More than 260,000 people who will find themselves out of work in 2018 because of new minimum wage laws, according to a study reported on by The Daily Caller:

The  study, conducted by the free market advocacy group American Action Forum, found that incremental minimum wage increases implemented in 2018 alone will cost the nation roughly 261,000 jobs. Once the minimum wage increases are fully phased in, they are expected to cost approximately 1.7 million jobs, using each state’s official employment projections as a baseline. The number is significant in light of the Bureau of Labor Statistics  2017 projection that the entire U.S. economy will add 11.5 million jobs over the next decade.
So far, only 12 states and the District of Columbia have jacked up the minimum wage, which is what the study noted above focused on. A rise in the national minimum wage would have even more dire ramifications.//

Fascinating.

The advantage that lighter skin gave for Vitamin D production was miniscule, but over enough time it reshaped the population....and not much time, all things considered.

Investigation closes in on the president....

...the wrong president.

//Newly revealed text messages between FBI paramours Peter Strzok and Lisa Page include an exchange about preparing talking points for then-FBI Director James Comey to give to President Obama, who wanted “to know everything we’re doing."

The message, from Page to Strzok, was among thousands of texts between the lovers reviewed by Fox News. The pair both worked at one point for Special Counsel Robert Mueller's probe of alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.

Page wrote to Strzok on Sept. 2, 2016, about prepping Comey because "potus wants to know everything we're doing." According to a newly released Senate report, this text raises questions about Obama's personal involvement in the Clinton email investigation.//

Worst Elites Ever.

Michael Barone is impressed by how out of touch the Democrats are.

//On what issues are Democrats taking such risks?

(1) Their undisguised faith that Donald Trump and his campaign colluded with Vladimir Putin’s Russia to steal the 2016 election. Maybe I’m wrong, but I don’t think this happened or that it has or will come anywhere close to being proven.

(2) The Republican tax bill was a “scam” that was going to take money away from those with modest incomes. A look at the tax rate schedules in the Republicans’ bill should have told Democrats that this argument wasn’t sustainable, and perhaps they made it in the hope—which didn’t seem too far-fetched at the time—that enough Republicans would waver, the bill would never pass and their characterization, with predictable help from the mainstream media, would stick. But the bill passed, modest and low-income people are getting raises and bonuses, and just about everyone will get a bigger paycheck later this month.

(3) Their claims that the Republicans were responsible for shutting the government down last month over DACA. Democrats knew that DACA was widely popular, but overestimated its importance to voters. It turns out they didn’t want the government shut down to help even deserving illegal immigrants. It’s hard for the party of more government to lose an argument over who caused a government shutdown, but they managed to do it.

(4) Their arguments that release of the Nunes memo would endanger national security, when it was obvious to anyone who read the memo that it wouldn’t. And then there's their ludicrous supporting argument that you should never harm the image of the FBI. Democrats have long been willing to criticize the FBI and other law enforcement agencies when they think it will help them politically, or when they think there has genuine abuse; the first is understandable and the second often commendable. How is this different?

This looks very much like those who live in an anti-Trump cocoon have such utter contempt for their fellow citizens outside that cocoon that they expect them to fall for unsustainable arguments. They have the excuse of knowing that most of the mainstream media will do so, but they seem not to have learned that a very large part of the American electorate no longer has respect for or pays heed to the mainstream media.

Political debate requires understanding how persuasive—or unpersuasive—arguments are and will prove over time. I’m surprised that Democrats aren’t doing a better job at this, and I suspect they’re reducing their credibility with many voters they have been taking for granted.//

They are victims of their own control of the media.

More antisemitic dog-whistles from the Trump administration.

Nailing down the alt-right/Nazi agenda:

//The Trump administration played a key role in thwarting a recent effort by the Irish government to boycott Israel and make it a crime for Irish citizens to purchase products made in contested areas of the Jewish state, a move that would have severely jeopardized Ireland's trade with the United States, according to multiple sources familiar with the situation.

The Irish Parliament was poised last week to pass a major piece of legislation that would make it crime to engage in trade with Israelis. The bill, which was seen as part of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement, or BDS, would have imprisoned Irish citizens who purchased souvenirs in Israel for a maximum of five years and subjected them to a fine of more than $310,000.

Upon learning of the effort, senior Trump administration officials in the State Department are said to have scrambled to open up channels to Irish leaders in a bid to scuttle the bill and avoid a standoff with the Irish government over the measure.

Trump administration officials are said to have made clear to Irish leaders that passage of the bill would put them starkly at odds with the United States and subject them to inclusion on a list of countries supporting boycotts of the Jewish state.

While some Irish lawmakers described the effort as a "crackpot bill," its passage through the Parliament was all but assured until U.S. officials from the Trump administration became involved, multiple sources told the Free Beacon.//

I've seen serious people on Facebook seriously search for coded antisemitism while ignoring this kind of thing.

Damore v. Google.

I watched a minute or so of this YouTube presentation.

It looks like the guy is breaking down the claims and law in the Damore v Google lawsuit

The best way to get rid of a bad law is to enforce it impartially...

...and likewise bad customs.

Hypersensitivity about seduction was hunky-dory when it was applied to the lesser breeds - e.g., conservatives and Foxnews employees - but once hypersensitivity began to be applied equally to the Good People, that was too much.

//More than 100 women signed an open letter Tuesday arguing against the #MeToo movement.

The letter, signed by renowned French actress Catherine Deneuve as well as writers, historians, journalists and entertainers, was published in Le Monde to “we defend freedom to importune, indispensable to sexual freedom.”

“Rape is a crime, but trying to seduce someone, even persistently or back-handedly, is not — nor is men being gentlemanly a macho attack,” the letter said.

“Men have been punished summarily, forced out of their jobs when all they did was touch someone’s knee or try to steal a kiss.”//

She's right, but this is the world that her class has made.

Let it burn itself out.

Science porn.

Jupiter.

If the elites were delivering the goods, then snobbery might be a decent governing philosophy.

//"Discussing Michael Wolff’s new book, Fire and Fury, Hilton said any claims by elitists and the establishment that Donald Trump was mentally unfit for the presidency came second to Trump’s promotion of a pro-worker, populist agenda on immigration, infrastructure, trade and the fight against China.

He went on to emphasise the shortcomings of Trump’s predecessors, adding: “My old boss, former British prime minister David Cameron, thought Obama was one of the most narcissistic, self-absorbed people he’d ever dealt with.

“Obama never listened to anyone, always thought he was smarter than every expert in the room, and treated every meeting as an opportunity to lecture everyone else. This led to real-world disasters, like Syria and the rise of Isis.”

But the real world did not matter to the elites, Hilton said. “For them, it’s all about style and tone, not substance and results. Donald Trump offends the elites aesthetically, like a piece of art that’s not to their taste."

When you allow taste to trump policy — and I’m addressing Bill Kristol directly here — you’ve elevated mere snobbery to a governing philosophy.//

Stephen Green

The penny drops.

I have always been confused about Comey's indictment/exoneration news interview, where he laid out a compelling case to indict Clinton but then said, "Nope, not enough."

Prior to this presentation, the word was that Comey was facing a rebellion by FBI agents who knew that there was enough to indict Hillary and wouldn't put up with sweeping it under the rug. This article suggests that was the case.

So, probably, Comey's presentation was aimed at his FBI constituency and was intended to acknowledge what they knew but then "bafflegab" the presentation with "lawyerese" so that they might decide that he was acting in good faith and following the law.

If that's the case, Comey looks more corrupt.

//Republicans on key congressional committees say they have uncovered new irregularities and contradictions inside the FBI’s probe of Hillary Clinton’s email server.

For the first time, investigators say they have secured written evidence that the FBI believed there was evidence that some laws were broken when the former secretary of State and her top aides transmitted classified information through her insecure private email server, lawmakers and investigators told The Hill.

That evidence includes passages in FBI documents stating the “sheer volume” of classified information that flowed through Clinton’s insecure emails was proof of criminality as well as an admission of false statements by one key witness in the case, the investigators said.//

There is a cancer in the FBI and Deep State that needs to be excised.

The Curley Effect

"Third worst economic environment for middle class families" is not a bug in the policy goals of California Democrats, it is a feature to make sure that California's have permanent hegemonic control over California in the same way that Democrats have control over Baltimore, Detroit and Chicago.

//Jerry Brown, repeatedly lionized in the national press, finally leaves office after next year, he will likely leave his successor both a totally out of control legislature and looming fiscal crisis. Brown’s replacement will also have to deal with a state that, according to the Social Science Research Council, suffers the greatest income inequality in the nation and the third worst economic environment for middle class families. Worse yet — upwards of one-third of the state population subsists near or in poverty.//

It takes a heart of stone not to laugh at Liberals, who are like High School football stars going back 50 years to their glory days while the oppression of the press under Obama.

A journalist asks those involved in the new film, "The Post," some obvious questions:

//For example, he reminded Streep and Spielberg that President Barack Obama flexed his might against journalists via the Espionage Act. Here’s how Jake Tapper put it:

“The Obama administration has used the Espionage Act to go after whistleblowers who leaked to journalists … more than all previous administrations combined.”

That doesn’t take into account Obama’s war against Fox News or how he spied on Fox News’ James Rosen.

How did Streep and Spielberg, hardcore Democrats who supported Obama during his two presidential terms, react? Let’s just say each has a potent political career awaiting them given their fancy footwork.

Here’s Asi’s corker:

“If you look at the numbers, there were more prosecutions under the Espionage Act during the Obama administration than any other administration. Yet no one in Hollywood was urged to say something about it, or do something about it…”

How did Spielberg answer?

He didn’t. He dodged the question entirely, rambling on about how Daniel Ellsberg, the key source behind The Pentagon Papers’ acquisition, wanted to stop the Vietnam War. Or something. Watch the clip yourself and see if his answer even remotely addresses the question (start at the 7:35 mark).

What about Streep?

The video doesn’t directly connect the question and answer, although given Streep’s response it’s apparent she’s attempting to answer it without actually doing so.

“I think it’s good that that is exposed now. I think we have to hold not only people that we have adversarial political views from to task but I think we also have to hold our friends and our compatriots, people who follow a line of policy that we agree with, we have to hold them to the same standard. I think that’s absolutely valid and important. And that’s sort of what the film is about.”

Asi asked a tough, but fair, question to these A-list stars. He deserves plenty of credit for that … even if the stars couldn’t fairly fire off a response.//

Billboards are not telephone calls.

Harassment by phone is direct, immediate and portends escalation; billboards, not so much.

However, California is prosecuting someone for posts on a Facebook page.  The posts are anti-Islamic; the page is an Islamic page.  The posts could be worse - I've seen worse directed at Catholics in my comments, at least.

Also, Facebook has a "block" function, which seems like a simple solution that doesn't involve the government picking and choosing what "annoying" comments get prosecuted.

Things we observe but do not see.

Scientists discovery actual counter-rotating, connected eddies that had been deemed theoretically possible. Apparently, scientists have been observing these for 25 years but did not understand what they were looking at.  Makes you think about the sudden discovery of new species, and how much of what we observe we don't see.

Gosh-wow, Science!!!

Saturn's rings may be only 150 million years old.

Rings may have been created when something unsettled previous generation of Saturn's moon, shredding one of them.

"Male Feminists."

Either a long con on the part of some men to get close to women or two-hundred thousand years of evolution has been repealed in the last generation.

Daniel Hanrahan, a student in the Master's degree program at the Kennedy School of Government admits to talking about women at a bar with his friends:

//Hanrahan recounts a harrowing tale from early last school year:

During Orientation Week in August of 2016, I was out late drinking in Harvard Square with two classmates. The topic switched to the women in our class. Over the drunken hum of the bar’s collective conversation, one guy proposed the “hottest” girls in our class. The other did the same. They both then asked me to rank the girls in our cohort in the order I wanted to get with. My alarmed heart bolted blood to my cheeks. I crossed my arms, unable to speak. “Are we making you uncomfortable?” one asked me. I cannot remember my exact response. But it was not: “Yes. Objectifying women, even though it seems harmless to you, demeans them and creates an environment that makes sexual assault more likely.” Instead, I uncrossed my arms, I shook my head, and yes, I discussed which girls were hot.

Hanrahan is up-front about his moral failure to say something to his friends that night: “At the time, it was easy for me to discard my act of cowardice as inconsequential. The desire to be included made the risk of speaking up too great. During many similar ‘inconsequential’ comments at the pub and locker rooms throughout my life, I know I’ve taken the easy way out.”

“My silence lies on a continuum of complicity,” Hanrahan writes, “complicity that allows sexual assault to occur.”//

In other news, it seems that "Women love the sexual interplay they experience with men, and they relish men desiring their beauty."

It's almost as if evolution/God has designed it so that men and women need/desire each other.

Weird.

Selling the dead.

Apparently, those "edited" videos really did show a conspiracy to sell fetal tissue.

In other news, the whistleblowers are under criminal indictment for revealing this crime.

Power corrupts.
And before it corrupts, it commits incest.

Fusion GPS paid wife of top DOJ official to obtain information for fake Trump dossier that was used to order FISA wiretaps on Trump political campaign.

Unsafe at any speed.

About a decade ago, I looked at a Cadillac from mid-70s and I was shocked to see all the things we took for granted back then - no seat belts, pokey, hard buttons sticking out to impale passengers, hard surfaces, a steering wheel that would split sternums, etc.

How did anyone survive?

But there's more!

On Tyranny - When Yale Professors come unglued.

James Lileks offers a nice "fisking" of Professor Snyder's puerile, histrionic "Trump is Hitler" essay.