Brexit Common Sense

Writing for Bloomberg, Clive Crook gets real about what Parliament can actually decide about Brexit.

Most of the options they’re intending to address have nothing to do with the decision Britain actually has to make by April 12 — the new exit date, recently extended from March 29 by the EU. As things stand, that decision comes down to three choices: Leave with no deal, accept the May-EU deal, or revoke Article 50. Those are the only decisions that can be made in time, and that rest solely with the U.K. All the others would require the EU’s assent and weeks and months of further negotiation.

And the EU is thoroughly tired of the Brits’ will-she-or-won’t-she indecision. We should know something soon.

Brexit Update

Just a quick note to update most of you who are not obsessively reading everything they can find about Brexit. Prime Minister Theresa May has asked for a months-long extension of the March 29 deadline, three days from now.

May has been granted a 2-4 week extension by the EU. The smart money says that brief extension won't be sufficient to achieve the parliamentary majority she seeks.

At this point nobody knows what will happen. The Brits are in parliamentary terra incognita in so many different ways. I'm still hoping for a "no deal" exit, although strictly speaking it's none of my business.

A Blast from the Past

I just ran across video of the 1984 Olympics ice dancing performance of Torval and Dean on YouTube. My question was simple: does their gold-winning performance hold up. My answer is equally simple: their performance is the best ice dancing I have ever seen, it's as good today as it was 35 years ago.

For my money, no pair has ever done it so well, so gracefully. Their 1984 Bolero is the gold standard in ice dancing.

Running a Bluff

Writing for Politico, Blake Hounshell asks why President Trump admires Vladimir Putin, and for that matter Kim Jong Un. I have an insight why this might be true, one the author doesn't mention.

Both those autocratic leaders manage to play "above their pay grade." They cleverly exploit whatever advantages their relatively poor lands possess.

Kenny Rogers sang that "every hand's a winner and every hand's a loser." A good poker player can bluff with a poor hand and, at least sometimes, win.

I suspect Trump sees these men as clever players doing relatively well with what are basically poor hands. They lead poor countries with far more problems than answers, and manage to make them at least somewhat powerful. Like them or hate them, they show a real skill.

The Campus Free Speech Mandate

At COTTonLINE we write about college/university matters from time to time, since we spent a mostly happy career in that cloistered environment. And I've waited to comment on the President's order requiring higher ed institutions to protect free speech, including speech that's unpopular with some or most students and faculty.

The New York Times has an article showing how the presidential order can make life easier for higher ed administrators because it gives them cover when victim group activists protest some speaker (or professor) who states something they view as "insensitive." The president or provost will point to this requirement and say something like "I sympathize with your concerns but the Federals insist I not interfere; my hands are tied."

The article does a better-than-average job of describing how victim group activists have college administrators over a barrel, and enjoy pressuring them. The new free speech requirement will make meeting unwritten minority enrollment "quotas" marginally more difficult to accomplish.

So be it. The game is worth the candle.

A Trenchant Quote

Instapundit Glenn Reynolds, in his weekly column for USA Today, writing about the sequelae of the Mueller report (scroll down).

We might someday need a press we can trust. But I hope not, because we certainly don’t have one.

If you delivered that comment doing stand-up comedy it would be followed by a rim-shot. Americans have been left with hobby journalists like Reynolds, the guys at Power Line, and our minor effort at COTTonLINE to carry the ball representing the views and values of middle America.

Mueller Report Musings

Attention must be paid. What will be the impact of the Mueller commission's findings? For starters, on the 2020 election outcome?

I'm willing to stipulate it will change no minds among the strong adherents of each party. I cannot imagine the findings strengthen the Democrats' standing with the independent part of the electorate.

Recent polling data finds fully half of Americans believe the Russian collusion probe was a witch hunt, doomed from the start to find nothing. Far fewer believed it fully justified.

Clinging to now-disproven assertions of traitorous activities makes Democrats look foolish. Looking foolish isn't how people get elected. Don't be surprised if Trump wins a larger percentage of the vote in 2020 than he did in 2016.

Among those who are big losers out of this fiasco, count the legacy media as losing more than most. They have demonstrated their utter bias and complete untrustworthiness. Who will believe them going forward?

Other big losers are the upper echelon swamp creatures of the Department of Justice and the FBI, whose Obama-era appointees appear to have committed indictable felonies. Less certain is whether these will ever be brought to justice.

Finally, the lesson for so many is the insanity of believing what you wish to be true is in fact true. Wishful thinking is a trap into which many have fallen.

Barr Summarizes Mueller

Attorney General William Barr's summary of the findings of the Mueller Special Counsel group vis-a-vis Russian collusion and obstruction of justice has been delivered to the Congress, and made public. Here it is posted on the Axios site, hat tip to Drudge Report for the link.

Per Barr, the report finds no collusion by any American with the Russian efforts to influence the 2016 election. With respect to obstruction of justice, Barr writes:

The Special Counsel states: "while this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him."

The Special Counsel's decision to describe the facts of his obstruction investigation without reaching any legal conclusions leaves it to the Attorney General to determine whether the conduct described in the report constitutes a crime.

After reviewing the Special Counsel's final report on these issues; consulting with Department officials, including the Office of Legal Counsel; and applying the principles of federal prosecution that guide our charging decisions, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and I have concluded that the evidence developed during the Special Counsel's investigation is not sufficient to establish that the President committed an obstruction-of-justice offense.

Barr goes on to make a salient point. If there was no collusion, then the President had no motive to obstruct justice and his actions, taken within the purview of the President's normal powers, cannot be adjudged to obstruct anything since he had nothing to fear from "justice" being done.

Barr adds there are matters in the report which existing law prohibits him from disclosing, meaning he cannot simply hand over the intact Mueller report. I'm certain there are Democrats who will dispute these last two claims.

Take the Quiz

Not everything at COTTonLINE needs to be deadly serious. The Daily Mail (U.K.) has a column with this provocative title:

Grammar quiz from the 1980s is so difficult most people only answer HALF the questions correctly ... so do YOU think you can do better?

Have some fun, take the quiz and then check your answers at the bottom of the column to see how you did. I'm darn good and I missed three questions: numbers 3, 18, and 20. With unerring skill the quiz zeroed in on a couple of words I always look up to be certain I use them correctly.

Hat tip to Lucianne.com for the link.

A Lesson

I was reading a ho-hum article in Foreign Policy about how International Relations theory doesn’t truly grasp the role of culture, which article I don’t recommend to you. It started me thinking about times when, working with grad students from other cultures, I’ve run into a “culture wall.”

Let me share one such with you. I was advising the thesis of an MBA student with a Math baccalaureate who was a member of the discriminated-against Chinese minority in Malaysia. Let’s call her Lee (not her actual name).

Lee had a combination of skills - math and business - which would have landed her a good job in a computer firm or as an insurance actuary. Her chances of getting a green card and staying in the U.S. looked hopeful in those less-immigration-burdened days perhaps 25 years ago.

Lee said, however, that she had to “go home.” I asked her what she’d do with her education there and she replied “perhaps teach high school mathematics.” It was a job that wouldn’t utilize her MBA.

I compared that future with her prospects in the States and asked why she felt she must go home? The answer was “my family wants me to come home.” I asked why they wouldn’t want her to stay here and perhaps follow her here at some later date. She said “no, I have to go home.”

It was a degree of filial piety you would essentially never see in an American, very Confucian. Lee was fully prepared, albeit unexcited, to go home because her father expected it, even though doing so fell far short of maximizing her potential, .

We looked at each other in mutual incomprehension and dropped the subject. I didn’t understand her commitment to family and she didn’t understand my American individualism. She graduated and went home.

Moral of the story: culture matters ... a lot.

Barone: Old Things New Again

Political analyst Michael Barone often writes things to which attention must be paid. In The Washington Examiner, he waxes historical about the legacy of our two major political parties.

The Republican Party, from its formation in 1854, has been built around a core of people considered to be ordinary Americans, but not by themselves a majority. The Democratic Party, from its formation in 1832, has been a coalition of those regarded as out-peoples, often at odds with each other, but together often a majority.

Barone sees today’s parties returning to their original roots, the GOP ins vs. the Dem. outs. It’s not a bad hypothesis, people who feel the country is “about” them vs. those who experience it as a bad fit.

Left unsaid is that there is a group of people who sometimes feel “in” and at other times feel “out,” depending on the economy and other issues. These constitute the independents or swing voters courted by both sides.

More Thoughts on the Mueller Opus

Literally no American was found to be knowingly colluding with Russia to influence the 2016 election. All of Mueller's indictments plus those of the New York federal prosecutor's office, aimed at U.S. citizens, have dealt with things other than collusion to influence the election.

Mueller indicted several Russians for interference in our elections. No one believes any of those will ever be tried as there is zero chance of extraditing them.

The only Americans who collaborated with Russians were employees of U.S. social media firms who accepted Russian political advertising buys or posted their opinion pieces. They claim to have done so unwittingly.

So ... from the get go the whole "Trump colluded with Russia" thing was pure bull crap or, if you prefer, a Democratic nocturnal emission. This is exactly what President Trump has claimed the whole time.

Trump wins. There are many sad Democrats tonight, and much Republican schadenfreude.

Another Friday Document Dump

Robert Mueller has delivered his final report to Attorney General William Barr, and presumably his special counsel investigation has concluded. Why do these things always come out on Friday, is Mueller embarrassed at how little he found?

While many have called for the release of the entire, unredacted document, including I believe the President, it isn't clear that will happen. Power Line's Paul Mirengoff writes:

Fox News reports that Mueller has not recommended any new indictments. Thus, President Trump will not be indicted based on the Mueller report. What we don’t know is why.

I get the impression that Barr is going to play Mueller’s report “by the book,” disclosing only as much as Justice Department rules and protocol call for.

If Barr holds Mueller's report close to his chest and discloses little, conspiracy theories will continue to spin. That isn't useful for anybody.

We need a new special counsel to examine the Clinton server debacle, her campaign's financial support of the shady people who created the "fake news" dossier (Glenn Simpson and Fusion/GPS), and politically biased actions by the upper reaches of the Obama-era DOJ and FBI. Indictable offenses occurred.

Hurricanes in FL? Who knew?

I get cranky when I read an article whose author claims to have discovered something I've known for years, or even decades. Let me share one such from msn.com's Money section, it reports there are people leaving Florida and treats this as a man-bites-dog story.

It begins with what we all know - Florida is a major destination for retirees. FL has warm weather, no state income tax, two major cruise ship ports and lots of beaches. The supposedly counterintuitive part of the story is that people also move out of FL.

The author believes this is because of recent unpleasant weather events and the increased insurance premiums resulting therefrom. And he quotes anecdotal evidence from several people he talked to who are moving out because - no kidding - FL has hurricanes. 

Undoubtedly, a much greater cause of people moving out is continued aging. Having lived just down the hill from a CA retirement town for much of the last 40+ years, I'm familiar with the patterns of such places. 

People move from employment communities to retirement communities as youngish, relatively healthy and active retirees. They move away when the infirmities of age begin to creep up and they require more help. 

When no longer active, they go live near their children. It is the reason there are always plenty of "For Sale" signs in retirement communities. Many only live there for a few years, others last longer and some few die there; although less than formerly when heart attacks took many men in their 50s and early 60s. 

So yes, people do leave FL as well as move there. Most who do are, if we're honest, "waiting for God" although no one wants to say so. For today's somewhat affluent, it is part of the concluding trajectory of a long life.

Choosing Poorly, Again

Fox News has hired Democrat operative Donna Brazile as a panelist and Democrat-leaning commentator. I saw her on Bret Baier’s Special Report last night. If what she said there was a fair sample of her ‘contribution’ either (a) she is a bad hire, or (b) Fox News is headed in a different direction politically.

One bad choice (Ryan as board member) is simply a misstep, a second bad choice (Brazile as contributor) could signal a trend. If there is a third stumble, then there is no reason for Fox to exist since we already have a surfeit of left-wing news up and running.

Trump and McCain

President Trump disses the memory of Sen. John McCain and many disapprove, citing McCain’s war hero status. Let’s be clear, McCain was a Navy pilot, a prisoner of war, and by all accounts served honorably and with valor.

If we have trouble with McCain, it is his subsequent career as a politician that troubles us. He was a failed presidential candidate, and a cantankerous Senator who resented Trump succeeding where he had failed.

McCain did whatever he could to stymie Trump, the elected head of his own party. It is possible to take a good ‘brand’ and tarnish it. McCain is a textbook case of that self-destructive behavior.

Punishing Excellence

Lucianne.com links to a column by David Marcus in The Federalist. Marcus writes about NYC Mayor De Blasio and the omnipresent AOC vocally unhappy at the underrepresentation of black and Hispanic kids in NYC’s elite high schools. Admission to these schools is by test scores alone, and as Marcus points out, Asians are vastly over represented making up 74% of the student body at Stuyvesant High.

What is clear is that Asian kids benefit from a pro-education home culture and a preponderance of two-parent homes. Less well known is that major Asian societies have rewarded test taking ability for hundreds of years; it is how the emperor’s elite civil servants were selected in imperial China.

Somewhere, the shade of author Kurt Vonnegut laughs uproariously, and waves a copy of his short story “Harrison Bergeron.”

They Chose ... Poorly

It is reported former House Speaker Paul Ryan is joining the board of directors of the reorganized Fox. He is a very unimpressive choice. As speaker Ryan was both (a) reluctant and (b) ineffective.

For two years which ended this past January, we had the rare situation where Republicans controlled the House, the Senate and the presidency. Ryan had a golden opportunity to move forward the GOP agenda ... and did not.

In the Senate McConnell did what he could without Ryan's help, confirming a number of right-leaning judges and appointees. Ryan basically did nothing except keep the lights on.

It appears Fox wants a do-nothing board member. They've selected one I'd describe as either GOP-lite or RINO.

Spring Arrives

Depending on who you believe, today or tomorrow is the official first day of spring, 2019. It is that moment where the number of daylight and dark minutes are equal, called the spring or vernal equinox.

Another way of picturing it is that we are exactly half way between the shortest and longest days of the northern hemisphere. That is, halfway between the winter and summer solstices.

I can’t speak for where you are, but here in NorCal the gray skies of winter persist and, if weather guessers are correct, will do so for another week. Global warming has been hard to detect this year.

Normally drought-stricken CA has seen a lot of rain and, in the mountains, snow. Instead of building reservoirs to catch this scarce resource, we’ve let most run off into the ocean. For that stupidity, we thank the state’s human-hating environmentalists.

Apple Falls Far From Tree

Bill Kristol is the son of Irving Kristol, conservative essayist extraordinaire. Iriving was a giant, a mensch. Son Bill ... not so much. The Kristols, father and son, constitute a near-textbook example of intellectual regression toward the mean.

The monthly column Kristol pere wrote for The Wall Street Journal was a strong influence in my education in politics and economics. Trading on the family reputation, Bill has tried to walk in his father's footsteps, but his intellectual "legs" aren't up to the challenge.

With Fred Barnes, Bill founded a conservative magazine - The Weekly Standard - in 1995. It recently folded after taking a hardline #NeverTrump position during the 2016 election. The #NeverTrump wing of conservatism might be large enough to support a newsletter, it isn't large enough to prop up a magazine of opinion.