Pat Condell on the Anti-American Dream

January 3rd, 2019

It seems that he’s not at all impressed with our social media “betters”:

Your Obligatory 2020 Democratic Party Presidential Horse Race Roundup

January 2nd, 2019

I hope you appreciate my extreme laziness restraint in not putting a 2020 Presidential Race Roundup up until now.

Here’s the list of Democrats widely contemplated as be willing to climb into the clown car. I’ve divided them into two categories: Shiny Things and Old Warhorses.

Shiny Things

  • Losing Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams: Doubtful. Says she’s open to the idea but hasn’t made any moves to run. Hard to see national donors backing her over Kamala Harris’ more obviously viable campaign.
  • Creepy Porn lawyer Michael Avenatti: Out, much to the disappointment of conservative pundits nationwide.
  • Montana Governor Steve Bullock: Maybe. He formed an exploratory PAC in 2017 and nobody noticed.
  • South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg: Acting like he’s running, despite no one knowing who he is. As a 36-year old gay white man, he only checks off one box in the Social Justice Warrior sweepstakes. He has twice Andrew Yang’s chance at being elected (2 x 0 = ___).
  • Former San Antonio Mayor and Obama HUD Secretary Julian Castro: Probably running. Evidently he didn’t want to let Beto O’Rourke take the “can’t win statewide in Texas so might as well run nationally” sweepstakes by default. Has the advantage (unlike O’Rourke) of being an actual Hispanic, but hasn’t made much of a national impression (or even a statewide impression).
  • Maryland Representative John K. Delany: Definitely in. AKA “Who?” Announced in 2017. He’s competing for the same “rich old white guy with the blue collar Catholic background” niche as Joe Biden, assuming that niche even exists for Democrats in 2020. You may think the guy has zero traction, but he’s already raised nearly $5 million.
  • Hawaii Representative Tulsi Gabbard: Running. As hard-left as Kamala Harris, except younger and prettier (not that any Democratic activist would admit that, even with a gun to their head). Doesn’t have Harris’ fundraising base or national media following. Sanders supporter in 2016, and she could be poised to pick up some Bernie Brigades if Sanders opts out.
  • Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti: Leaning toward a run. Hard to see where he finds running room, with Kamala Harris sucking up all the California money. Thomas Bradley is the standard for Los Angeles mayors running for higher office: A series of stinging defeats. But Democrats could do worse, and almost certainly will.
  • Former Tallahassee Mayor and failed Florida Senate candidate Andrew Gillum: Probably not. Beto O’Rourke raised a zillion dollars to overperform and still lose in 2018, while Gillum raised far more modest sums to underperform to lose a winnable race.
  • California Senator Kamala Harris: Almost certainly in: Hasn’t announced yet, but is acting like a candidate and raising money. The Social Justice Warrior and New York Times (but I repeat myself) favorite.
  • Former Texas Representative and failed Senatorial candidate Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke: Probably In. Hasn’t announced, but Ann Althouse thinks he’s running based on this video, and I don’t see any reason for him not to run, with high favorables, strong polling and having just received a zillion fawning national media profiles. The rules used to be that you couldn’t run for President if you lost your last race. But Hillary Clinton ignored that and won the nomination, and Richard Nixon won the presidency despite two high profile losses (the 1960 Presidential race and the 1962 California Governor’s race). And all sorts rules got thrown out with Trump’s election.
  • Incoming New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio Cortez: Constitutionally ineligible to run, as she won’t turn 35 until October 13, 2024. Duh. Listed only for the sake of completeness.
  • Ohio Democratic Representative Tim Ryan: Probably running. Seen most recently getting pantsed by Nancy Pelosi. Basically Beto without the fake Hispanic name, the senate run, the huge fundraising, or the fawning media coverage. So not like Beto at all…
  • California Representative Eric Swalwell: Probably running. Why is anybody’s guess. Joking about nuking gun owners may attract media attention, but voting for an unknown white guy with 1980s hair doesn’t seem to be on the Democratic Party activist agenda these days.
  • Venture capitalist Andrew Yang: Running but no one cares. He’s only a multimillionaire, which won’t get it done as an unknown outsider.
  • Wildcard Random Celebrity: You know some Democratic consultants must be looking high and low for “the Democratic Donald Trump,” the celebrity outsider that comes in and takes a crowded field by storm. Who has the gravitas to pull it off? George Clooney or Brad Pitt, maybe. Other A-listers I can think of have too much baggage (Robert Downey Jr.’s drug convictions, Tom Cruise’s Scientology, Ben Affleck/Matt Damon backing #MeToo targets, etc.) to be serious contenders. Dwayne Johnson says he’s not running (and might be a Republican).
  • Wildcard Random Billionaire: No idea who that would be, except it’s not going be to Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates. (Have you seen those guys speak?) Tom Steyer, maybe. Given the effectiveness his financial backing has had thus far, he could top the John Connelly in 1980 campaign for most money spent for fewest delegates garnered record.
  • Old Warhorses

    Some are old, and some are very old.

  • Former Vice President Joe Biden: Waffling. Biden has to think he could have taken Trump if he hadn’t left the field to Hillary. He seems to be laying the groundwork for a run. If elected, Biden would be 78 at his swearing-in ceremony.
  • Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg: Maybe. Says he’ll decide in the next couple of months. Can self-fund, but it’s hard to see how a guy less popular than Rudy Guilianni could do what he didn’t, and he’s sure to get dinged by Democrats for having been elected mayor as a Republican, no matter how nominal.
  • New Jersey Senator Cory Booker: Probably in. Spartacus said he’s considering it. He’s probably in because New Jersey law lets him run for both the Presidency and for reelection to the senate simultaneously. Second only to Elizabeth Warren in diminishing his chances in 2018.
  • Outgoing California Governor Jerry Brown: Maybe. His aura smiles and never frowns. But that speculation is from 2017, and Brown would be 82 come inauguration day. Brown first ran for president in 1976 and ran an effective, underfunded insurgent campaign in 1992.
  • Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown: Considering a run. A moderate from a swing state, Brown has the sort of resume Democrats used to consider for President, but these days he’s looking a lot more like the safe Old White Guy VP choice.
  • Pennsylvania Governor Senator Bob Casey, Jr.: Maybe. Hasn’t said yes or no. I could cut-and-paste most of the Sherrod Brown verbiage here. His primary appeal is geographic (Trump won Pennsylvania), which doesn’t seem to matter much to Democratic primary voters. [Corrected. – LP.]
  • Former First Lady, New York Senator and losing 2016 presidential candidate Hillary Clinton: Probably not. She wasn’t even healthy enough to run effectively in 2016, how is she going to take the grind in 2020? So I don’t give much credence to reports she’ll run. Her absence has not made Democratic voting hearts grow fonder. If I had to guess, she’s secretly hoping that Democrats end up with a brokered convention and she emerges as the consensus compromise nominee without having to campaign.
  • New York Governor Andrew Cuomo: Probably not. Says he’s not running. We know Cuomo lies, but his declaration, and the fact that so many Democratic-friendly media outlets that have previously given him a pass for his sleaze would attack him to boost other (likely non-male and non-white) contenders will probably keep him out.
  • New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio: All but out. Hasn’t announced he’s not running, but he barely even bothers to show up for his current job. Widely loathed with no national base and no notable fundraising prowess. Other than that he’s in good shape…
  • New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: Probably not. Young by warhorse standards, but she’s been a senator since 2009. Says she’s not running, and I don’t see voters crying out to vote for another female senator from New York…
  • Former Vice President Al Gore: No signs of a run, despite certain Democratic insiders openly pining for him.
  • Outgoing Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper: Probably in. Might be able to run as the “Pro Pot Candidate.” Unless that will be…
  • Washington Governor Jay Inslee: In. He’s running as the “all in on global warming” president, which I suspect has all the activist cachet of a Presbyterian sermon in a Democratic Party dominated by illegal alien activism and victimhood identity politics.
  • Virginia Senator and Hillary Clinton’s 2016 Vice Presidential running mate Tim Kaine: Probably not. Veep picks used to be considered contenders, but Kaine didn’t exactly set the world on fire. Said he wasn’t running right after Trump’s surprise victory, and hasn’t said anything to change minds since.
  • Former Obama Secretary of State and Massachusetts Senator John Kerry: Considering running. I don’t see him getting much traction, but he’s rich enough (from marrying well) to self-fund. He and Biden would be the only candidates with notable foreign policy experience (disasterous though it was), but when has that mattered in a recent Democratic Presidential primary?
  • Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar: Considering a run. A strong contender to snag some Clinton feminist cadres, having not made the many missteps Elizabeth Warren has, but it’s hard to see her gain much fundraising traction.
  • Former Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe: leaning toward it. Personally I expect the public appetite for a figure so closely linked to the Clintons to be extremely limited in 2020, and I don’t see any running room for him if any of the higher profile Old White Guys run.
  • Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley: Considering a run. In the Senate since 2009. Can you be an old warhorse if no one knows who you are?
  • Former First Lady Michelle Obama: Out. Both she and her husband say she’s not running. For once we should probably take them at their word…
  • Former Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick: Out. Says he’s not running, and there’s already enough real and potential Massachusetts candidates in the race.
  • Vermont Socialist Senator Bernie Sanders: Probably running. Getting screwed by Hillary and talk of a “socialist wave” in 2018 (deluded though it was) must be steeling his resolve, even though he’s a year older than Joe Biden.
  • Talk show host Oprah Winfrey: Probably not running. She says she’s not: “In that political structure — all the non-truths, the bullsh*t, the crap, the nastiness, the backhanded backroom stuff that goes on — I feel like I could not exist. I would not be able to do it. It’s not a clean business. It would kill me.” Translation: I’m just too pure for your rough and tumble politics.
  • Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren: In. She’s announced she’s running. After years of self-inflicted wounds, I expect her to lose badly.
  • Am I missing anyone here?

    Happy New Year!

    January 1st, 2019

    Welcome to the exciting, bold new year of 2019! You made it!

    Instead of actual content, here’s Colin Furze making and wearing a 1000 RPM belt of spinning knives:

    Tomorrow: Hopefully something resembling actual content.

    Louis C.K. and the Social Justice War on Comedy

    December 31st, 2018

    This is the Louis C. K. comedy routine than has the usual Social Justice Warrior “That’s not funny!” scolds in a tizzy this morning (NSFW, just in case you were unclear on that part):

    “You didn’t get shot! You pushed some fat kid in the way, and now I have to listen to you?”

    Back when I was doing standup comedy in the 1980s, this wouldn’t have even raised an eyebrow. Setting aside Louis C.K.’s sleazy (but non-indictable) exhibitionist masturbation, it’s curious to see someone who cheerfully violated taboos both left and right suddenly subjected to the standard SJW Five Minute Hate Mob for material so comparatively mild.

    Remember all the conservative calls to end Louis C.K.’s career after he talked about wanking off on 9/11?

    Yeah, me neither.

    One can only imagine the outrage if the SJW were freshly presented with really transgressive comedy routines from the likes of Lenny Bruce, Red Foxx, Robin Williams, Richard Pryor, Bill Hicks or Sam Kinison. One can imagine that the accidental broadcast of an Andrew Dice Clay concert might result in San Francisco burning to the ground.

    The collision course between Social Justice Warrior ideology and comedy has been a long time coming, sweeping in everything from Monty Python to Bill Burr and everything in-between.

    So the right gets to own all comedy from now on? I’m fine with that. We’ll get Blazing Saddles and Archer and South Park and the left gets to keep Kathy Griffin and drum circles.

    Diana Fleischman and Jonathan Pie on the Gender Pay Gap Myth

    December 30th, 2018

    Diana Fleischman is an evolutionary psychologist at the University of Portsmouth. (Also, when she was going to graduate school at UT Austin many years ago, we dated very briefly.) Here she is debunking the gender pay gap myth.

    She’s only in the first three minutes or so, the rest of the discussion features other people, including Andrew Doyle, the producer for Tom Walker’s “Jonathan Pie” fake British telejournalist videos. Here’s the Pie sex gap video they reference above:

    They also interview Kate Andrews from the Institute for Economic Affairs and Joanna Williams, a Senior Lecturer at University of Kent.

    Why No New Housing Gets Built in San Francisco

    December 29th, 2018

    A property owner spent nearly 5 years and $1.4 million trying to convert his laundromat into new housing in San Francisco’s Mission district, only to find that city’s far left political establishment hates letting new housing be built.

    And they wonder why San Francisco has a homeless problem…

    LinkSwarm for December 28, 2018

    December 28th, 2018

    The week between Christmas and New Years is always odd. Work slows down with so many people on vacation, but there’s always a personal rush to get things done before the end of the year.

  • Kevin D, Williamson follows the idiots of antifa around the streets of Portland. That is, when they weren’t accidentally following him:

    If you want to see what a bunch of half-baked idiots and kettle-corn psalmists in a political march are up to, the easiest thing to do is to march around with them, as I did for a while in Portland. I do not look much like Tucker Carlson, and I remain, for the moment, able to blend in with such groups.

    Which I did — and a funny thing happened: As the march began to peter out, a group of Antifa loitered for a bit on a street corner, and I loitered with them for a while, observing. And then I got tired and decided to bring my labors to an end and go on my merry. As I walked off, a contingent, apparently believing that we were once again on the move against fascism, began to follow me, pumping their fists and chanting, until they figured out that I wasn’t leading them anywhere. And thus did a National Review correspondent end up briefly leading an Antifa march through Portland.

    Of course they followed me. They’ll follow anything that moves.

  • The psychological warfare campaign we carried out against Islamic State troops in the field.
  • National Review‘s Andrew McCarthy on the Syrian pullout:

    There has never been any vacuum in Syria (or Iraq). Sharia supremacism fills all voids. In focusing on ISIS, David discounts sharia supremacism as “an idea.” But it is much more than that. It is a cultural distinction — even, as Samuel Huntington argued, a civilizational one. It will always be a forcible enemy of the West. It doesn’t matter what the groups are called. You can kill ISIS, but it is already reforming as something else. In fact, it may no longer even be the strongest jihadist force in Syria: Its forebear-turned-rival al-Qaeda is ascendant — after a few name changes (the latest is Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, the Levant Liberation Organization) and some infighting with other militant upstarts. There is a better chance that ISIS will reestablish ties with the mothership than fade away.

    The fact that al-Qaeda, which triggered the “War on Terror,” does not factor into American clamoring about Syria is telling. The anti-ISIS mission David describes was not always the U.S. objective in Syria. First we were going to pull an Iraq/Libya redux and help the “moderates” overthrow Assad. But the “moderates,” in the main, are Muslim Brotherhood groups that are very content to align with al-Qaeda jihadists — and our fabulous allies in Syria, the Turks and the Saudis, were only too happy to abet al-Qaeda. Syria had thus become such a conundrum that we were effectively aligning with the very enemies who had provoked us into endless regional war.

    When ISIS arose and gobbled up territory, beheading some inhabitants and enslaving the rest, Obama began sending in small increments of troops to help our “moderate” allies fend them off. But the moderates are mostly impotent; they need the jihadists, whether they are fighting rival jihadists or Assad. Syria remains a multi-front conflict in which one “axis” of America’s enemies, Assad-Iran-Russia, is pitted against another cabal of America’s enemies, the Brotherhood and al-Qaeda factions; both sides flit between fighting against and attempting to co-opt ISIS, another U.S. enemy. The fighting may go on for years; the prize the winner gets is . . . Syria (if it’s the Russians, they’ll wish they were back in Afghanistan).

    Degrading ISIS into irrelevance would not degrade anti-American jihadism in Syria into irrelevance. If sharia didn’t ban alcohol, I’d say the old wine would just appear in new bottles. It was, moreover, absurd for President Trump to declare victory just because ISIS has been stripped of 95 percent of the territory it once held. Caliphate aspirations notwithstanding, ISIS’s mistake was the attempt to be an open and notorious sovereign. It was always more effective as a terrorist underground, and it still has tens of thousands of operatives for that purpose.

    If we stayed out of the way, America’s enemies would continue killing each other. That’s fine by me. I am not indifferent to collateral human suffering, but it is a staple of sharia-supremacist societies; we can no more prevent it in Syria than in Burkina Faso. And I am not indifferent to the challenge David rightly identifies: terrorists occupying safe havens from which they can plot against the West. But that is a global challenge, and we handle it elsewhere by vigilant intelligence-gathering and quick-strike capabilities. We should hit terrorist sanctuaries wherever we find them, but it is not necessary to have thousands of American troops on the ground everyplace such sanctuaries might take root.

  • Kurt Schlichter on the return of Trump the Disrupter:

    Trump campaigned on his promise to build a wall. He told Frisco Nancy and Chuck Odd that he would shut down the government if he didn’t get his wall money. The Republican establishment, which does not really want a wall because the GOP corporate donor class doesn’t want to turn off the spigot of cheap foreign peasant labor even though those illegals are all future Democrat voters, led Trump on and on. They put continuing resolution after continuing resolution in front of him, each time promising to really, truly, cross-my-heart-and-hope-you-die fight next time. He gave them a chance. He gave them too many chances. And they expected he’d go along again this time. But conservatives drew the line and Trump realized that he needed to do what he did best to get back inside the ruling class’s decision cycle.

    He needed to disrupt, so he kept his promise. He refused to play along with the wall scam anymore. And the gleeful Dem senators singing carols as they expected to get away with another grift ended their serenade with a sad trombone. Now the government is going to shut down, and Trump has zero to lose by holding out.

    Then he cranked up the disruption when he announced he was getting out of Syria, and it’s clear that Afghanistan is probably next. The establishment reacted with surprise and horror. It’s hard to understand the “surprise” part, since he campaigned on getting us the hell out of foreign hellholes and has always wanted to. Again, he played along, giving the establishment a chance. And another. And nothing happened. So now he’s done. He’s doing what he promised.

    Is this withdrawal a good idea? That depends – we definitely need to provide for the safety of our Kurdish allies, and how that will happen remains unclear at this writing. ISIS is a danger; departing necessarily accepts risk. While the conservative anti-nation building attitude is blind to our successes doing it (like in Kosovo), neither Syria nor Afghanistan seem particularly fertile soil for it. And who is eager to dump more money into them after all the trillions we’ve wasted since 2001?

    But beyond the substantive considerations is the fact that the overwrought reaction of the establishment to the idea of actually ending a war supports Trump’s plan. What is our objective anyway? What’s the endstate? In the War College they taught us we should have those things. But the screamers never tell us – instead, it’s always invective about how we love Putin, or how we are stupid or whatever, when we ask, “Okay, how much more in time, money and American lives should we devote to these projects?” We never get a timeline, or a dollar figure, or the number of coffins that they consider whatever their unarticulated objective happens to be is worth.

    We keep hearing ISIS might return and we have to stay to stamp out those creeps again, and fine, killing jihadists is cool, but if the goal is to keep Mideastern jerks from being themselves then we will never, ever leave. The elite always denies it wants us to be the world’s policemen, but then it always demands that we keep walking a beat that never ends.

  • President Trump hasn’t destroyed free trade, he’s split it into two: One set of trading partners for us and our allies, and another set for China:

    The status quo with China is crumbling. Businesses have grown disillusioned with China’s restrictions on their activities, forced technology transfer and intellectual-property theft, all aimed at building up domestic competitors at foreign expense. Meanwhile, legislators in both parties are alarmed at increased military assertiveness and domestic repression under President Xi Jinping.

    Dan Sullivan, a Republican senator from Alaska, personifies these broader forces reshaping the U.S. approach to the world. Mr. Sullivan has followed the rise of China for decades—as a Marine sent to the Taiwan Strait in 1996 in a response to Chinese provocations; as an official in George W. Bush’s National Security Council and State Department; and for a time as Alaska’s commissioner of natural resources.

    When Mr. Xi visited the U.S. in 2015, Mr. Sullivan urged his colleagues to pay more attention to China’s rise. On the Senate floor, he quoted the political scientist Graham Allison: “War between the U.S. and China is more likely than recognized at the moment.”

    Last spring, Mr. Sullivan went to China and met officials including Vice President Wang Qishan. They seemed to think tensions with the U.S. will fade after Mr. Trump leaves the scene, Mr. Sullivan recalled.

    “I just said, ‘You are completely misreading this.’” The mistrust, he told them, is bipartisan, and will outlast Mr. Trump.

    While delivering one message to China, Mr. Sullivan gave a different one to the administration and its trade negotiators: Don’t alienate allies needed to take on China.

    “Modernize the agreements but stay within the agreements,” he says he counseled them. “Then we have to turn to the really big geostrategic challenge facing our country and that’s China.”

    His was one voice among many urging Mr. Trump to single out China for pressure. Presidents Obama and George W. Bush sought to change China’s behavior through dialogue and engagement. Obama officials had begun to question engagement by the end of the administration. Last year, in its National Security Strategy, the Trump administration declared engagement a failure.

    The Trump administration regards economic policy and national security as inseparable when it comes to Beijing, because China’s acquisition of Western technology both strengthens China militarily and weakens the U.S. economically.

    “We don’t like it when our allies steal our ideas either, but it’s a much less dangerous situation,” said Derek Scissors, a China expert at the American Enterprise Institute whose views align with the administration’s more hawkish officials. “We’re not worried about the war-fighting capability of Japan and Korea because they’re our friends.”

    Snip.

    Michael Pillsbury, a Hudson Institute scholar close to the Trump team who has long warned of China’s strategic threat, sees three plausible scenarios. At one extreme is a new cold war with drastically curtailed economic ties. At the other, the U.S. and China resolve their tensions, continue to integrate and run the world together.

    Between those extremes, Mr. Pillsbury sees a more likely and desirable middle path—a transactional U.S.-China relationship of the sort that prevailed during the 1980s in which the two decide, case by case, when to do business and when to decouple.

    Stray thought: With the U.S. disengagement with various Middle Eastern conflicts, there’s a possibility that the less-Trump Derangement Syndrome-besotted ranks of the neocons might pivot to back Trump against China. After all, there was no end to neocon Jeremiads against China prior to the 2016 election…

    (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)

  • Paradoxically, U.S.-China trade has exploded recently.
  • The Wall Street Journal takes down the Washington Post‘s shoddy reporting of President Donald Trump’s visit with the troops:

    These reporters can’t even begin a news account of a presidential visit to a military base without working in a compilation of Mr. Trump’s controversies, contradictions, and failings.

    The point isn’t to feel sorry for Mr. Trump, whose rhetorical attacks on the press have often been contemptible. The point is that such gratuitously negative reporting undermines the credibility of the press without Mr. Trump having to say a word.

    (Hat tip: Brit Hume on Twitter.)

  • Related:

  • Sad news: Austin’s own Richard Overton, America’s oldest living vet, died yesterday at age 112.
  • A roundup of how many anti-#GamerGate “journalists” turned out to be scumbag sexual abusers themselves.
  • Speaking of scumbag sexual abusers, Kevin Spacey has finally been indicted for sexual assault. The one tiny bright spot is that it was an 18-year old man, so it’s slightly less reprehensible than the statutory rate charges made against him. [Insert innocent until proven guilty disclaimer here.]
  • Previously Deported Honduran Child-Sex Offender Arrested in Texas.” (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)
  • Shocking news: Washington Post readers actually blame the illegal alien father who brought his son along as a pawn in his plan to enter the U.S., only to see him die. “Reading these comments, I believe the American culture has changed radically since the fall of 2016, when Trump was painted as a racist for saying the situation at the border had to change. I think, for all the press resistance to Trump’s fight against illegal immigration, minds have changed.”
  • Mexico Beach, Florida: a tough road to recovery.
  • Speaking of Brit Hume: Six days after hip replacement surgery and he’s already walking around:

  • “Man Bravely Abandons Unpopular Christian Belief To Affirm Extremely Popular Cultural Belief.”
  • Heh:

  • Theyyy’rrrree Heeeere…

    Let’s hope Stark gets the nuke back through the portal before it closes…

  • The $2 Million Park Bathroom

    December 27th, 2018

    John Stossel examines your tax dollars at work:

    It took way longer to build that bathroom than the Empire State Building…

    Cops Behaving Badly

    December 26th, 2018

    Sometimes law enforcement officers use poor judgement. This week’s examples:

  • Buying cocaine for the prostitute you’re having rough sex with may be a career-limiting move. Especially if you’re an Austin police officer.
  • From New York, an officer that failed to heed Jeff Cooper’s rules. If he had, he wouldn’t have had to fire 27 shots, including those that hit two bystanders. (Hat tip: Dwight, for both.)
  • Meanwhile, Baltimore gonna Baltimore:

    Right at the top of the department’s struggles were the racketeering convictions of eight members of its once-elite Gun Trace Task Force. Two sergeants and eight detectives robbed citizens under protection of their badges and claimed massive amounts of overtime for hours they did not work. In November, a ninth officer, former Baltimore and Philadelphia cop Eric Snell, pleaded guilty to charges that he conspired to sell drugs with the GTTF members.

    Also this: “The city surpassed 300 homicides for the fourth year in a row. It has earned the grim designation of having the worst homicide rate among the nation’s 50 largest cities last year, according to FBI data released in September.”

  • The Los Angeles Police Department, on the other hand, is dealing with a revenge porn scandal:

    A Los Angeles Police Department employee is accusing her co-worker of releasing revenge porn.

    According to KABC, Ysabel Villegas is a detective with the LAPD’s Robbery-Homicide Division. Villegas filed a temporary restraining order against LAPD senior lead officer Danny Reedy.

    Villegas is also married to former LAPD Assistant Chief Jorge Villegas. Eyewitness News has learned he suddenly retired earlier this year after a sex scandal involving a subordinate officer.

    According to the restraining order, Ysabel Villegas claims she had a romantic relationship with Officer Danny Reedy for five years.

    She alleges in the restraining order that after their relationship ended, Reedy distributed explicit photos of her, without her consent.

    They all sound like such wonderful people.

    Caveat: Lisa Bloom is Ysabel Villegas’ attorney, so don’t assume she’s telling the truth…

  • Merry Christmas!

    December 25th, 2018

    Merry Christmas! Instead of political blogging, enjoy Stellarscope’s shoegaze version of “Silent Night”: