Jeanne Mancini, President, March for Life:

Pro-Life Women Are Not A Minority, And The Media Can’t Comprehend This

As a woman, I do not identify at all with the opinions expressed in Cosmo’s recent article “Abandoning Abortion Rights Means Abandoning Women”.

We are not abandoned, we are empowered.

Anyone who says otherwise does not speak for me, nor for the millions of women across the United States who firmly believe that being pro-life and pro-woman go hand in hand.

Pro-life women are not a “fringe minority”. In fact, we are a part of the nearly 8 in 10 majority of Americans that support major abortion restrictions, including restricting abortion to the first 3 months of pregnancy.

Politically speaking, respect for the dignity of all human life is a consistently a winning issue that both parties should embrace. The 2016 election is clear evidence of this.

In an extreme departure from the “safe, legal and rare” mantra, in last year’s presidential election, the Democratic National Committee platform not only abandoned the 26% of Democrats who identify as pro-life, but the 44% of their base who do not want their tax dollars funding abortion, by advocating for unlimited abortion access and a full repeal of the Hyde amendment, which, until that time had widely been considered popular, bipartisan policy. Meanwhile, Donald Trump committed to “work to support the dignity of human life from conception to natural, dignified death” during his campaign and was elected President.

This is not “fringe”.

Pro-life women are not a “discomforted set” of society clinging to an archaic anthem of female subservience. We are CEOs, lawyers, doctors, teachers, writers, baristas, college students, and everything in between, and we believe that our unique capacity for motherhood does not lessen our ambition, but rather, furthers our potential for greatness. . .

Asserting that women are nothing without unrestricted access to Planned Parenthood, abortion and birth control is degrading. Abortion access does not constitute feminism. True female empowerment means ensuring that all women have equal and full access to the resources and opportunities to that they need to achieve their dreams, whatever those may be.

Though dressed in trappings of pink pu**y hats and girl-power positivity, organizations like Planned Parenthood and NARAL speak to further their own political agenda, personal funding, and self-promotion; not women’s interest. Abortion opens the door to exploitation, but choosing life leads to love.

In contrast, we speak not just for ourselves, but for the unborn. It is our own decision to be both unabashedly pro-life and unwaveringly pro-woman; and we will not be voiced over.

Feminists for Life have a wonderful slogan, “Women deserve better than abortion.” Women deserve to have political allies that recognize this. It is time to invest in true women’s empowerment and in life.

Daily Caller

 

The Violence in Charlottesville

The vast majority of people in the United States have no interest whatsoever in street battles between the alt-right (better described today in more poignant terms) and the counter-protesters. Most people have normal problems like paying bills, dealing with kids, getting health care, keeping life together under all the usual strains, and mostly want these weird people to go away. So, of course, people are shocked at scenes of young people in the streets of this picturesque town with a university founded by Thomas Jefferson screaming, “Jews will not replace us.”

It’s hard to see, hard to hear. But they are not going away. For some people with heads full of violent ideology, what's happened so far is not enough. They imagine that with their marches, flags, uniforms, slogans, chants, screams, and guns, they will cause history to erupt and dramatically turn to favor them over the people they hate. Indeed, what is unfolding right now, with real loss of property and life, has gone beyond politics as usual and presages something truly terrible from the past, something most of us had previously believed was unrepeatable. 

What in the world causes such a thing? It’s not about bad people as such. Many of the young men and women involved in this movement were raised in good homes and, under normal conditions, would never hurt anyone. What this is about is bad ideas. They crawl into the brain and cause people to imagine things that do not exist. It can be like a disease that a person doesn’t even know that he or she has. It causes people to seeth with hated for no apparent reason, to long for the extermination of people who have never done anything wrong, to imagine insane outcomes of social struggles that have zero chance of succeeding. . .  

The question is: what to do now? The answer lies in the source of the problem. The huge mess began with bad ideas. The only means available – and it is the most powerful – is to fight bad ideas with good ideas. We all need to throw ourselves into the intellectual battle most of all and as never before. What are those good ideas? 

The progress of the last 500 years shows us precisely what the good ideas are: social harmony, human rights, the aspiration of universal dignity, the conviction that we can work together in mutual advantage, the market economy as a means of peace and prosperity, and, above all else, the beauty and magnificence of the idea of liberty itself. 

Let us all – those who love peace, prosperity, and human flourishing for all – not despair but rather rededicate ourselves to the mission of replacing bad ideas with good ones. Our predecessors in this mission faced far worse odds and they prevailed, and they were far fewer than us. We can too, provided we think, speak, and act with courage and conviction in favor of all that is beautiful and true. This is how the left/right cycle of violence will be replaced by the highest longings of the human heart.

Jeffrey Tucker - Foundation Economic Education 

The Art of the Deal

China Changes Tone On N. Korea: From Not Our Problem To We’ll Deal With It

Daily Caller

On this day in 1939,

WIZARD OF OZ PREMIERES IN OCONOMOWOC, WISCONSIN

WISN.com

On this day in 1981,

IBM ANNOUNCES IT WILL SELL DESKTOP COMPUTER

The birth of the IBM PC

David Brooks:

GOOGLE CEO SHOULD RESIGN

When it comes to the genetic differences between male and female brains, I’d say the mainstream view is that male and female abilities are the same across the vast majority of domains — I.Q., the ability to do math, etc. But there are some ways that male and female brains are, on average, different. There seems to be more connectivity between the hemispheres, on average, in female brains. Prenatal exposure to different levels of androgen does seem to produce different effects throughout the life span.

In his memo, Damore cites a series of studies, making the case, for example, that men tend to be more interested in things and women more interested in people. (Interest is not the same as ability.) Several scientists in the field have backed up his summary of the data. “Despite how it’s been portrayed, the memo was fair and factually accurate,” Debra Soh wrote in The Globe and Mail in Toronto.

Geoffrey Miller, a prominent evolutionary psychologist, wrote in Quillette, “For what it’s worth, I think that almost all of the Google memo’s empirical claims are scientifically accurate.”

Damore was especially careful to say this research applies only to populations, not individuals: “Many of these differences are small and there’s significant overlap between men and women, so you can’t say anything about an individual given these population-level distributions.”

David Brooks NYT

IT WAS A BRENNAN OPERATION

Even lefty Seymour Hersh agrees that the Russian fable begin in the mind of Obama’s CIA director.

American Spectator

Japan Sends Surprise To US Fleet In Massive Show of Support For President Trump

Will join in defense of U.S. territories, including Guam.

WorldNewsPolitics

Ann Althouse's Rule for Discussing the Differences Between Men and Women

I tried to help you guys long ago when I devised the rule that many people have repeated and called The Althouse Rule (e.g., Instapundit, 3 days ago). The rule, as I put it in November 2005: 

Scientists: remember to portray whatever you find to be true of women as superior.

I've said it before, and I must repeat, the rule is: If you do scientific research into the differences between men and women, you must portray whatever you find to be true of women as superior. And when you read reports about scientific research into the differences between men and women, use the hypothesis that the scientists are following that rule. It makes reading the reports quite humorous.

American Thinker

WHY THE SWAMP HATES TRUMP

President Trump is reminiscent of the Founding Fathers – the type of statesmen who surmounts incredible odds to build the greatest country in the world.  Now, after many years of being led by a man who apologized for our country, we have a leader working indefatigably to make America great again!

Bob Weir

On this day in 1964,

WATTS RIOTS BEGIN

On this day in 1964, five days of rioting started in the predominantly black Watts neighborhood of South Central Los Angeles after two white policemen stopped a black motorist suspected of drunken driving. The rioters eventually ranged over a 50-square-mile area looting stores, torching buildings, and beating whites as snipers fired at police and firefighters. The National Guard had to be called in to restore order.  The rioting left 34 dead, 1,032 injured, nearly 4,000 arrested, and $40 million worth of property destroyed. 

This Day In History

On this day in 1984,

President Ronald Reagan: “My fellow Americans, I’m pleased to tell you today that I’ve signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes.” 

On this day in 1984, Ronald Reagan joked during a sound check prior to his weekly radio address, “My fellow Americans, I’m pleased to tell you today that I’ve signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes.”  

The press (local and foreign), Democrats, moral preeners, and other elitists totally missed the joke – showing the same lack of humor that they exhibit today:

In Paris, a leading newspaper expressed its dismay, and stated that only trained psychologists could know whether Reagan’s remarks were “a statement of repressed desire or the exorcism of a dreaded phantom.” A Dutch news service remarked, “Hopefully, the man tests his missiles more carefully.” Other foreign newspapers and news services called Reagan “an irresponsible old man,” and declared that his comments were “totally unbecoming” for a man in his position. In the Soviet Union, commentators had a field day with Reagan’s joke. One stated, “It is said that a person’s level of humor reflects the level of his thinking. If so, aren’t one and the other too low for the president of a great country?” Another said, “We would not be wasting time on this unfortunate joke if it did not reflect once again the fixed idea that haunts the master of the White House.” 

This Day in History

Don't be a Google.

It’s Long Past Time To End All Discrimination Policies And Restore Equal Protection 

Every single special preferences policy based on group identity needs to go. . . If a law is good enough for one American, it should be good enough for all Americans, or it’s not a good law. This is what true equality means.

The Federalist

The (liberal) Nation

A New Report Raises Big Questions About Last Year’s DNC Hack

Former NSA experts say it wasn’t a hack at all, but a leak—an inside job by someone with access to the DNC’s system.

We come now to a moment of great gravity.

There has been a long effort to counter the official narrative we now call “Russiagate.” This effort has so far focused on the key events noted above, leaving numerous others still to be addressed. Until recently, researchers undertaking this work faced critical shortcomings, and these are to be explained. But they have achieved significant new momentum in the past several weeks, and what they have done now yields very consequential fruit. Forensic investigators, intelligence analysts, system designers, program architects, and computer scientists of long experience and strongly credentialed are now producing evidence disproving the official version of key events last year. Their work is intricate and continues at a kinetic pace as we speak. But its certain results so far are two, simply stated, and freighted with implications:

• There was no hack of the Democratic National Committee’s system on July 5 last year—not by the Russians, not by anyone else. Hard science now demonstrates it was a leak—a download executed locally with a memory key or a similarly portable data-storage device. In short, it was an inside job by someone with access to the DNC’s system. This casts serious doubt on the initial “hack,” as alleged, that led to the very consequential publication of a large store of documents on WikiLeaks last summer.

• Forensic investigations of documents made public two weeks prior to the July 5 leak by the person or entity known as Guccifer 2.0 show that they were fraudulent: Before Guccifer posted them they were adulterated by cutting and pasting them into a blank template that had Russian as its default language. Guccifer took responsibility on June 15 for an intrusion the DNC reported on June 14 and professed to be a WikiLeaks source—claims essential to the official narrative implicating Russia in what was soon cast as an extensive hacking operation. To put the point simply, forensic science now devastates this narrative.

First Tom Friedman, now T.A.. Frank/Vanity Fair has a stopped clock moment

THE DEMOCRATIC CASE FOR RESTRICTING IMMIGRATION

Regulations never work out entirely as planned or hoped, but, in an ideal world, a skills-based selection system and an end to illegal immigration would lead to dramatic improvements for Americans in the coming decades, similar to the period of wage compression and social cohesion that characterized the four-decade stretch of low immigration prior to 1965. It would mean a more harmonious and caring country with a stronger social safety net. It would mean a prioritization of equity over pace of economic growth. So here’s an attempt to lay out a non-hostile—meaning non-Trumpian—vision of what might happen with a Trumpian immigration policy, a best-case theory for a world that admittedly tends to surprise us in practice.

With stricter border enforcement, employers would immediately start to feel a reduction of available labor, as is already happening. Wages would tick up. On the more gradual front, with a system that selects for skill, most immigrants coming to the United States would out-earn the native-born, raising per-capita productivity for everyone and boosting our fiscal health. With the share of low-skill workers becoming smaller, many sorts of employment would start to pay better: home care, security work, massage therapy, dishwashing, gardening, housekeeping, cleaning, construction, gardening, manufacturing. Out in the fields, agricultural wages would likewise start to rise little by little. Union drives would go better, as employers stopped being able to threaten workers with deportation. We’d see more productivity innovations as labor costs forced businesses to make better use of their human resources or to mechanize, as in Japan. . .

T.A. Frank Vanity Fair

The Anasazi of Mesa Verde

Archaeologists discover evidence of a vanished civilisation from 1300s

Prehistoric mitochondrial DNA of domesticate animals supports a 13th century exodus from the northern US southwest

This study thus provides the first direct genetic evidence, by way of a domestic animal proxy, in support of the hypothesis that Tewa communities occupying the NRG region today derive in large measure from the migration of 13th century CMV populations. If true, this would support a scenario in which migration was a primary solution of CMV populations in the face of significant social and environmental problems, as it often is for human groups under extreme duress today.

Journals.Plos.org

Black Unemployment Hits Historic Low Under Trump

Bureau of Labor Statistics

Can someone show us a climate prediction that has ever come true?

Instead of facts, these articles always give us theoretical predictions.  I would ask the reporters how many previous predictions of the last 30 or 100 years have been accurate.  I can't think of any.  Why should we believe the new predictions?

We were told after Hurricane Katrina in 2005 that hurricanes would be more frequent and stronger than ever.  Instead, we have had more than eleven years where hurricanes have been mild to nonexistent.  Tornado activity has also been lower than normal, so why are we told that storms are getting more extreme? . . . 

American Thinker

 

A sign of The End Times?

TOM FRIEDMAN HAS A STOPPED CLOCK MOMENT

You know what they say about a stopped clock being right twice a day? Tom Friedman, the New York Times‘s second most predictably dismal columnist, had one such moment in yesterday’s column. . .

The main point of the article was a list of four issues where, Friedman says, “Trump has a point.” I assume Friedman is safely sequestered in Martha’s Vineyard this week and beyond the reach of pitchfork-wielding Times readers. (Actually, since most Times readers wouldn’t know which end of a pitchfork to pick up, just what do angry Times readers brandish? An old Smyth & Hawken trowel perhaps?)

Heeeere’s Tommy:

What issues? Here’s my list:

• We can’t take in every immigrant who wants to come here; we need, metaphorically speaking, a high wall that assures Americans we can control our border with a big gate that lets as many people in legally as we can effectively absorb as citizens.

• The Muslim world does have a problem with pluralism — gender pluralism, religious pluralism and intellectual pluralism — and suggesting that terrorism has nothing to do with that fact is naïve; countering violent extremism means constructively engaging with Muslim leaders on this issue.

• Americans want a president focused on growing the economic pie, not just redistributing it. We do have a trade problem with China, which has reformed and closed instead of reformed and opened. We have an even bigger problem with automation wiping out middle-skilled work and we need to generate more blue-collar jobs to anchor communities.

• Political correctness on college campuses has run ridiculously riot. Americans want leaders to be comfortable expressing patriotism and love of country when globalization is erasing national identities. America is not perfect, but it is, more often than not, a force for good in the world.

Power Line Blog

DHS: 23% of all federal prisoners are illegals, just 7 of 42,034 saved from deportation

Nearly one-quarter of all federal inmates are illegal immigrants and virtually all are in deportation proceedings or already face removal orders, according to a new Homeland Security report.

The Justice Department's Bureau of Prisons, fulfilling a presidential executive order requiring transparency on prisoner immigration status, said that it houses 187,855 inmates of which 42,034 are foreign born.

The DHS report said that only seven of those 42,034 have been granted deportation "relief."

Washington Examiner

On this day in 1945,

United States Drops Second Atomic Bomb on Nagasaki

On this day in 1945, the U.S. dropped a second atom bomb on Japan at Nagasaki, forcing Japan’s unconditional surrender.  Somewhere between 60,000 and 80,000 people were killed, with exact figures impossible to determine because so many bodies were virtually vaporized.

Although the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were devastating, the “fire-bombing” of Tokyo the prior March was worse, resulting in 100,000 deaths, a million homeless, and 16 square miles of complete desolation.

Wikipedia Bombing of Nagasaki

Wikipedia Tokyo Fire-Bombing

Althouse Calls "Bulltweedle" NYT Claim of Unprecedented Trump North Korea "Harsh Language"

First, there was President Harry S. Truman, in 1945, demanding Japanese surrender or “they may expect a rain of ruin from the air, the like of which has never been seen on this earth."

* * *

Second, there was Bill Clinton, in 1993:

... during a speech in the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea that if Pyongyang ever used nuclear weapons, “it would be the end of their country.”

Althouse Blog

Can't wait to see what happens to her

Female Ph.D. Sexual Neuroscience: No, the Google manifesto isn’t sexist or anti-diversity. It’s science.

By now, most of us have heard about Google’s so-called “anti-diversity” manifesto and how James Damore, the engineer who wrote it, has been fired from his job.

Titled Google’s Ideological Echo Chamber, Mr. Damore called out the current PC culture, saying the gender gap in Google’s diversity was not due to discrimination, but inherent differences in what men and women find interesting. Danielle Brown, Google’s newly appointed vice-president for diversity, integrity and governance, accused the memo of advancing “incorrect assumptions about gender,” and Mr. Damore confirmed last night he was fired for “perpetuating gender stereotypes.”

Despite how it’s been portrayed, the memo was fair and factually accurate. Scientific studies have confirmed sex differences in the brain that lead to differences in our interests and behaviour.

Debra Soh Opinion Piece

America’s Media Elites Are Hopelessly Biased Against Ordinary White People, Professor Says

A professor at one of the most prestigious fancypants liberal arts colleges in the United States has criticized America’s media elites for blindly and universally supporting aggressive affirmative action and relaxed immigration policies.

Frederick Lynch, a government professor at Claremont McKenna College, took to the op-ed pages of The New York Times this weekend to argue that journalists — and throngs of academics — have responded to Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential election with “thinly veiled scorn.” This attitude “has inhibited deeper study” of the possibility that “working- and middle-class whites” are “responding to legitimate economic threats” posed by policies promoting affirmative action, lax immigration restrictions and ethnic diversity for the sake of ethnic diversity.

Daily Caller

Meet the Press with Tim Russert 1999

Trump on North Korea 18 Years Ago

This guy doesn't change much, does he?

You Tube

On this day in 1974,

NIXON RESIGNS

Original WaPo article below:

Richard Milhous Nixon announced last night that he will resign as the 37th President of the United States at noon today.

Vice President Gerald R. Ford of Michigan will take the oath as the new President at noon to complete the remaining 2 1/2 years of Mr. Nixon's term.

After two years of bitter public debate over the Watergate scandals, President Nixon bowed to pressures from the public and leaders of his party to become the first President in American history to resign.

"By taking this action," he said in a subdued yet dramatic television address from the Oval Office, "I hope that I will have hastened the start of the process of healing which is so desperately needed in America."

Vice President Ford, who spoke a short time later in front of his Alexandria home, announced that Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger will remain in his Cabinet.

The President-to-be praised Mr. Nixon's sacrifice for the country and called it "one of the vary saddest incidents that I've every witnessed."

Mr. Nixon said he decided he must resign when he concluded that he no longer had "a strong enough political base in the Congress" to make it possible for him to complete his term of office.

Declaring that he has never been a quitter, Mr. Nixon said that to leave office before the end of his term " is abhorrent to every instinct in my body."

But "as President, I must put the interests of America first," he said.

While the President acknowledged that some of his judgments "were wrong," he made no confession of the "high crimes and misdemeanors" with which the House Judiciary Committee charged him in its bill of impeachment.

Specifically, he did not refer to Judiciary Committee charges that in the cover-up of Watergate crimes he misused government agencies such as the FBI, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Internal Revenue Service.

After the President's address, Special Prosecutor Leon Jaworski issued a statement declaring that "there has been no agreement or understanding of any sort between the President or his representatives and the special prosecutor relating in any way to the President's resignation."

Jaworski said that his office "was not asked for any such agreement or understanding and offered none."

His office was informed yesterday afternoon of the President's decision, Jaworski said, but "my office did not participate in any way in the President's decision to resign."

Mr. Nixon's brief speech was delivered in firm tones and he appeared to be complete control of his emotions. The absence of rancor contrasted sharply with the "farewell" he delivered in 1962 after being defeated for the governorship of California.

An hour before the speech, however, the President broke down during a meeting with old congressional friends and had to leave the room.

He had invited 20 senators and 26 representatives for a farewell meeting in the Cabinet room. Later, Sen. Barry M. Goldwater (R-Ariz.), one of those present, said Mr. Nixon said to them very much what he said in his speech.

"He just told us that the country couldn't operate with a half-time President," Goldwater reported. "Then he broke down and cried and he had to leave the room. Then the rest of us broke down and cried."

In his televised resignation, after thanking his friends for their support, the President concluded by saying he was leaving office "with this prayer: may God's grace be with you in all the days ahead."

As for his sharpest critics, the President said, "I leave with no bitterness toward those who have opposed me." He called on all Americans to "join together . . . in helping our new President succeed."

The President said he had thought it was his duty to persevere in office in face of the Watergate charges and to complete his term.

"In the past days, however, it has become evident to me that I no longer have a strong enough political base in the Congress to justify continuing that effort," Mr. Nixon said.

His family "unanimously urged" him to stay in office and fight the charges against him, he said. But he came to realize that he would not have the support needed to carry out the duties of his office in difficult times.

"America needs a full-time President and a full-time Congress," Mr. Nixon said. The resignation came with "a great sadness that I will not be here in this office" to complete work on the programs started, he said.

But praising Vice President Ford, Mr. Nixon said that "the leadership of America will be in good hands."

In his admission of error, the outgoing President said: "I deeply regret any injuries that may have been done in the course of the events that led to this decision."

He emphasized that world peace had been the overriding concern of his years in the White House.

When he first took the oath, he said, he made a "sacred commitment" to "consecrate my office and wisdom to the cause of peace among nations."

"I have done my very best in all the days since to be true to that pledge," he said, adding that he is now confident that the world is a safer place for all peoples.

"This more than anything is what I hoped to achieve when I sought the presidency," Mr. Nixon said. "This more than anything is what I hope will be my legacy to you, to our country, as I leave the presidency."

Noting that he had lived through a turbulent period, he recalled a statement of Theodore Roosevelt about the man "in the arena whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood" and who, if he fails "at least fails while daring greatly."

Mr. Nixon placed great emphasis on his successes in foreign affairs. He said his administration had "unlocked the doors that for a quarter of a century stood between the United States and the People's Republic of China."

In the mideast, he said, the United States must begin to build on the peace in that area. And with the Soviet Union, he said, the administration had begun the process of ending the nuclear arms race. The goal now, he said, is to reduce and finally destroy those arms "so that the threat of nuclear war will no longer hang over the world." The two countries, he added, "must live together in cooperation rather than in confrontation."

Mr. Nixon has served 2,026 days as the 37th President of the United States. He leaves office with 2 1/2 years of his second term remaining to be carried out by the man he nominated to be Vice President last year.

Yesterday morning, the President conferred with his successor. He spent much of the day in his Executive Office Building hideaway working on his speech and attending to last-minute business.

At 7:30 p.m., Mr. Nixon again left the White House for the short walk to the Executive Office Building. The crowd outside the gates waved U.S. flags and sang "America" as he walked slowly up the steps, his head bowed, alone.

At the EOB, Mr. Nixon met for a little over 20 minutes with the leaders of Congress -- James O. Eastland (D-Miss.), president pro tem to the Senate; Mike Mansfield (D-Mont.), Senate majority leader; Hugh Scott (R-Pa.), Senate minority leader; Carl Albert (D-Okla.), speaker of the House; and John Rhodes (R-Ariz.), House minority leader.

It was exactly six years ago yesterday that the 55-year-old Californian accepted the Republican nomination for President for the second time and went on to a narrow victory in November over Democrat Hubert H. Humphrey.

"I was ready. I was willing. And events were such that this seemed to be the time the party was willing for me to carry the standard," Nixon said after winning first-ballot nomination in the convention at Miami Beach.

In his acceptance speech on Aug. 8, 1968, the nominee appealed for victory to "make the American dream come true for millions of Americans."

"To the leaders of the Communist world we say, after an era of confrontation, the time has come for an era of negotiation," Nixon said.

The theme was repeated in his first inaugural address on Jan. 20, 1969, and became the basis for the foreign policy of his first administration.

Largely because of his breakthroughs in negotiations with China and the Soviet Union, and partly because of divisions in the Democratic Party, Mr. Nixon won a mammoth election victory in 1972, only to be brought down by scandals that grew out of an excessive zeal to make certain he would win re-election.

Mr. Nixon and his family are expected to fly to their home in San Clemente, Calif. early today. Press secretary Ronald L. Ziegler and Rose Mary Woods, Mr. Nixon's devoted personal secretary for more than two decades, will accompany the Nixons.

Alexander M. Haig Jr., the former Army vice chief of staff who was brought into the White House as staff chief following the resignation of H.R. (Bob) Haldeman on April 30, 1973, has been asked by Mr. Ford to remain in his present position.

It is expected that Haig will continue in the position as staff chief to assure an orderly transfer of responsibilities but not stay indefinitely.

The first firm indication yesterday that the President had reached a decision came when deputy press secretary Gerald L. Warren announced at 10:55 a.m. that the President was about to begin a meeting in the Oval Office with the Vice President.

"The President asked the Vice President to come over this morning for a private meeting -- and that is all the information I have at this moment," Warren said.

He promised to post "some routine information, bill actions and appointments" and to return with additional information" in an hour or so."

Warren's manner and the news he had to impart made it clear at last that resignation was a certainty. Reports already were circulating on Capitol Hill that the President would hold a reception for friends and staff members late in the day and a meeting with congressional leaders.

Shortly after noon, Warren announced over the loudspeaker in the press room that the meeting between the President and the Vice President had lasted for an hour and 10 minutes.

At 2:20 p.m., press secretary Ziegler walked into the press room and, struggling to control his emotions, read the following statement:

"I am aware of the intense interest of the American people and of you in this room concerning developments today and over the last few days. This has, of course, been a difficult time.

"The President of the United States will meet various members of the bipartisan leadership of Congress here at the White House early this evening.

"Tonight, at 9 o'clock, Eastern Daylight Time, the President of the United States will address the nation on radio and television from his Oval Office."

The room was packed with reporters, and Ziegler read the statement with difficulty. Although his voice shook, it did not break. As soon as he had finished, he turned on his heel and left the room, without so much as a glance at the men and women in the room who wanted to question him.

There were tears in the eyes of some of the secretaries in the press office. Others, who have been through many crises in recent years and have become used to overwork, plowed ahead with their duties, with telephones ringing incessantly.

In other offices, loyal Nixon workers reacted with sadness but also with resignation and defeat. They were not surprised, and some showed a sense of relief that at last the battle was over.

Some commented bitterly about former aides H.R. (Bob) Haldeman and John D. Ehrlichman. The President's loyal personal aide and valet Manola Sanchez, a Spanish-born immigrant from Cuba whose independence and wit are widely admired, did not hide his feelings.

Speaking bluntly to some of his old friends, he castigated aides he said had betrayed the President. One long-time official, who heard about the Sanchez remarks, commented: "They [Haldeman and Ehrlichman] tried three times to fire him because they couldn't control him. Imagine, trying to fire someone like Manola."

But why did the President always rely on Ehrlichman and Haldeman? The official was asked. "Will we ever know?" he replied. "When Mr. Nixon was Vice President," he recalled, "he demanded that we never abuse the franking privilege. If there was any doubt, we were to use stamps. Everything had to be above board.

"Surely his friendship with Ehrlichman and Haldeman was one of the most expensive in history."

But the President himself, said another long-time aide, must have been two persons, the one who was motivated by high ideals and another who connived and schemed with his favorite gut-fighters.

One man who worked through most of the first Nixon term said he saw the President angry only once. Often he would say, "That will be tough politically, but we must do the right thing."

When that official left his post after nearly four years of intimate association with the President, he told his wife: "I've never gotten to know what sort of man he is."

One official, who has known Mr. Nixon well for many years and remains a White House aide, commented: "He is obviously a bad judge of character. But a lot was accomplished. So much more could have been accomplished but for these fun and games. It was such a stupid thing to happen."

The march of events that brought about the President's downfall turned its last corner Monday when Mr. Nixon released the partial transcripts of three taped conversations he held on June 23, 1972 with Haldeman.

It seemed inevitable then that this would be his last week in office, yet he continued to fight back and to insist that he would not resign. On Tuesday, the President held a Cabinet meeting and told his official family that he would not resign.

On Wednesday, however, the end appeared near, for his support on Capitol Hill was disappearing at dizzying speed. There were demands from some of his staunchest supporters that he should resign at once.

Late Wednesday, the President met with Senate Minority Leader Hugh Scott (R-Pa.), House Minority Leader John J. Rhodes (R-Ariz.) and Sen. Barry M. Goldwater (R-Ariz.).

They said afterward that the President had made no decision, but it was obvious later that for all intents and purposes the decision had been made despite what the leaders said. They obviously could not make the announcement for him, but it must have been apparent to them that the end was at hand.

Later Wednesday, Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger twice conferred with Mr. Nixon, first in the early evening for half an hour and then from 9:30 p.m. until midnight.

It was not known whether the two men were alone or accompanied by Haig and others.

Yesterday, Kissinger met with principal deputies in the State Department to tell them what to expect and to assign tasks to different people. Messages will be sent to heads of state to notify them formally of the change.

A White House spokesman said more than 10,000 telephone calls were received in the past two days expressing "disbelief and the hope that the President would not resign."

Thursday was a wet, humid August day, but despite intermittent rain the crowds packed the sidewalks in front of the White House. It was an orderly crowd, resigned and curious, watching newsmen come and go and being a part of a dramatic moment in the life of the nation.

WaPo Article 8/9/74

On this day in 1863,

Robert E. Lee Offers to Resign 

On this day in 1863, in partial response to the viciously negative press of his day, Confederate General Robert E. Lee offered to resign following his loss at Gettysburg and the near simultaneous fall of Vicksburg.  Confederate President Jefferson Davis refused to accept Lee’s resignation.  

This Day in History
Wikipedia

"Parents should be able to pick the school where they think their children will get the best-quality education”

‘Turnaround Principal’ returns to open Paterson charter school

Google Fires Viewpoint Diversity Manifesto Author James Damore

Beitbart

More contrarian analysis from my third favorite economist

Gary Shilling: U.S. Labor Over Supply

The Fed worries that the current 4.4 percent unemployment rate means that labor markets are too tight, but it also worried about a much higher rate back in December 2012. The central bank stated then that the federal funds rate, then in the zero-to-0.25-percent range, would be “appropriate at least as long as the unemployment rate remains above 6.5 percent, inflation one and two years ahead is projected to be no more than a half percentage point above the [policy] Committee’s 2 percent long run goal and long-term inflation expectations continue to be well anchored.”

But the Fed had to abandon that unemployment target as this very poor measure of labor market conditions fell, not so much due to increased employment but mainly because fewer people were looking for work. Youths stayed in school in hopes that more education would improve their job prospects, and many middle-aged people, discouraged over poor job prospects, discontinued their search for employment.

The many dropouts may well be drawn back to work as opportunities expand. Indeed, the labor force of those age 20 to 29 has been growing since 2012. At the same time, people over 65 who are employed or actively looking has been rising since the early 1990s. Many seniors are in good health and prefer active work to vegetating in front of the TV. Others, among them many postwar babies born in the 1946-1964 years, have been notoriously poor savers throughout their lives and need to keep working due to a lack of retirement assets.

As a result, the total labor participation rate appears to have bottomed. From September 2015 to this June, it rose from 62.4 percent to 62.8 percent. The growth in the working-age population will provide ample people to fill available jobs, even if economic growth accelerates from the recent average of 2.1 percent to my forecast of 3 percent to 3.5 percent -- assuming they have the needed skills.

Also, keep in mind that, like capacity utilization data measures of labor market slack on a global basis aren’t available. It certainly appears, however, to be ample, and the skills of workers in Asia are rising rapidly, not only in the production of goods but in services as well.

Gary Shilling Blog

 

Rush Limbaugh

The Swamp Will Do Whatever It Takes to Remove Trump

Rush Limbaugh 8/7 Transcript

New study says $15 minimum wage would kill 47,000 jobs in Montgomery County MD

But it's only money

The Blaze

Yes, Obama, those jobs are coming back

The Art of the Deal: iPhone Supplier Foxconn Announces Second Plant Coming to Michigan in Trump Era

Breitbart

My 2nd favorite economist

Kudlow: ‘Trump Factor’ Is Powering Strong Economic Gains

Article and Audio Interview

American Thinker: There is a War Over Who Will Control The Government

Liberals, Dems, Conservatives, Deep Staters v. Trump

Will democracy survive in the United States?

Here's what should be concerning now: 

If this pattern of the last six months continues, there will develop a real threat to the Republic and to the survival of democratic government.  While the national security threats the United States is presently facing – North Korean ICBMs, Chinese man-made islands in the South China Sea, and an expansive Russia – are serious and pressing, the most serious threat may be within. 

We may be confronting a national security threat comparable to that which the United States (unknowingly) faced in the 1940s when American communists and fellow travelers penetrated the federal government, the Executive Branch, and the White House.  It was pooh-poohed at the time, called a "witch hunt" and a "Red Scare," but, decades later,  the release of the Venona Intercepts and the opening of Soviet archives after the fall of the Soviet Union confirmed that, in fact, Soviet penetration of the highest levels of the U.S. government had occurred – and resulted in the loss of state secrets. 

Here, there can be no dispute. The proof is appearing every day in our American media.

Attorney General Sessions is, therefore, amply justified in pursuing prosecution of the source(s) of these national security leaks – and, if necessary, targeting their media enablers. 

The question of whether an American Deep State exists can be deferred until another time.  May cooler heads prevail until then. 

But for now, the current crisis is not some political sideshow for the annual August "silly season."  It is a struggle over who controls the government of the United States. 

American Thinker

Althouse Rips Republican Senator Jeff Flake's Contempt For Ordinary People

I'm concerned about the expressions of contempt for ordinary people and democracy. I can see saying we need more structured principles and sane practicality, but it feels disrespectful to say "populism is a sugar high."

Althouse Blog

Liberals’ Class Warfare on the Working Class Keeps Trump Afloat

Democrats won’t win back voters they view with contempt.

From John Fund/National Review:

The House Majority PAC last month released an exhaustive survey. McClatchy’s Alex Roarty summarized the findings as “white voters without a college degree still view Trump relatively favorably, their opinion of Democrats is in the dumps, and they reject some of the party’s favored economic initiatives.” 

Asked which party will “improve the economy and create jobs,” Republicans have a 35-point edge among white working-class Democrats. They have a 19-point edge when it comes to ensuring people are rewarded for their hard work, and a 15-point edge on middle-class tax cuts. Democrats have only a four-point edge on health care, a surprise given the unpopularity of the GOP’s failed Senate plan. 

The biggest challenge that liberals will face in trying to win back the voters who have drifted to the GOP is finding a way to conceal their agenda. The poll and its accompanying focus group found that Democrats are hurt by the perception that they care mostly about upper-income concerns such as free or reduced college tuition, and they look down with thinly veiled contempt on working-class voters. Many of those voters don’t think college is a ticket to prosperity, and many prefer blue-collar jobs. “In short, when these voters hear people tell them that the answer to their concerns is college, their reaction is to essentially say — don’t force your version of the American Dream on me,” the House Majority PAC concluded. 

John Fund

On this day in 1945,

U.S. Drops First Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima

On this day in 1945, the United States dropped the first atom bomb over the city of Hiroshima.  The bomb exploded 1,900 feet over a hospital.  Approximately 80,000 people were killed immediately, another 35,000 injured, and at least another 60,000 killed by the end of the year from the effects of the fallout.

The Hiroshima city government had put hundreds of schoolgirls to work clearing fire lanes in the event of incendiary bomb attacks. They were out in the open when the Enola Gay dropped its load.

There were 90,000 buildings in Hiroshima before the bomb was dropped; only 28,000 remained after the bombing. Of the city’s 200 doctors before the explosion; only 20 were left alive or capable of working. There were 1,780 nurses before - only 150 remained who were able to tend to the sick and dying.

President Harry Truman made the decision to drop the atomic bomb because Japan refused to surrender and Truman feared a long campaign with many fatalities if the U.S. were forced to invade and fight a land war.  Three days later the U.S. dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki.  Japan announced its surrender on August 15.

Wikipedia
This Day in History

 

From the American Interest
How Obama’s Weakness Encouraged Russian Election Meddling
The American Interest

Here's the Other Republican Senator from Arizona Who Should Be Replaced

Bashing Trump is Hurting Flake

Republican Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake’s approval rating is at a drastically low number in his home state after he has continued to bash President Donald Trump according to a new Democratic Poll.

The left leaning polling group, Public Policy Polling (PPP) found only 18 percent approve of the job Flake is doing. Meanwhile 62 percent disapprove and 19 percent are not sure how they feel about him. These numbers come after Flake has continued to criticize Trump throughout his presidency and refused to endorse him during the 2016 presidential campaign.

If the 2018 mid-term election were held today, just 31 percent of respondents said they would support Flake’s re-election bid, compared to 47 percent who said they would support a generic Democratic opponent, according to the poll.

The poll was conducted from July 31st to August 1st among 704 Arizona voters. PPP has been known to be 5 or more points off the actual result. It tends to under sample and usually does not weight results in accordance with actual population.

Daily Caller

Borsuk: Milwaukee voucher schools are improving, but challenges remain

The voucher sector in Milwaukee is growing stronger and better. Quality overall is improving. Many of the private schools are doing more to get their act together.

Why do I say these things? Here are a few reasons:

A lot of weak schools are gone. School Choice Wisconsin and the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty issued a report last week with a lot of data on schools that have survived and schools that have closed. The two organizations are strongly pro-voucher, but the data deserve attention. Since 1990, 268 private schools have received voucher payments. About 120 are in the program now. All those others? Many were cut off because of state regulatory pressure; many closed just because they were small and badly run. And few of the departed should be mourned.

At the same time, fewer schools are opening. This is good. In the early days of voucher expansion, from about 1998 to 2004, too little was done to control the gate for public money. Unqualified and unprepared people opened many schools. Especially since 2009, the gate has been guarded much better and sure-to-be weak schools just aren’t opening. 

This fall, only one new voucher school is opening in the city, the big and highly ambitious St. Augustine Preparatory Academy on the south side. In addition, there are five schools outside the city new to the Milwaukee voucher roster, but they are not expected to enroll many kids from the city.

The stronger are surviving, generally. The School Choice/WILL study says voucher schools that are doing better academically have been more likely to stay in business and schools with poor track records have been more likely to close. The specific lists support that conclusion.

The Center for Urban Teaching is on a rapid rise. This is a factor that has gotten little general attention. CfUT recruits undergraduate students from a broad list of universities and offers them summer programs and other support to get them on track for teaching jobs, many — but not all — of them in local religious schools. It also works with teachers who want to move into school leadership. More than 300 people took part in its training this summer. Originally affiliated with Wisconsin Lutheran College, it is now an independent organization. Many of the better private school leaders in town see it as an important part of improving teaching in their schools.

Seton Catholic Schools is entering its second year. Its drive to improve the performance of a roster of Catholic schools serving low-income students in the Milwaukee area is showing early signs of progress.

The same with the HOPE and LUMIN schools. Both have ties to Lutheran denominations, both work with small networks of schools and both are earning respect. A side note: The rise of mini-school districts like these is an important development and is probably a positive thing overall.

Voucher schools finally are part of the state’s school report card system. Year by year, the information in the report cards will become richer and provide a better public view for how these schools are doing.

None of this is to say everything is rosy. Overall results of the voucher program remain disappointing in the big picture, especially for those who once argued that it would do so much to improve academic outcomes.

Why haven't voucher schools done better? In broad terms, because achievement in high-poverty communities doesn’t come easily. The majority of private schools in the city serve kids with much the same dynamics as public school kids.

Furthermore, when I look at the full list of schools enrolling voucher students this year, there are still more than a few about which I have had long-time qualms. Quality concerns remain. (The same is true for all other sectors of schools in the city.)

One issue that should be mentioned: Has the rise of vouchers left Milwaukee Public Schools with disproportionate obligations to educate kids with special education needs? My best reading of reality is: generally, yes. But the picture is more complicated and subtle than some advocates say. Private schools overall have more kids who actually have special ed needs than critics say. And some private schools are dedicated to special ed. But MPS advocates have valid points on this front.

In the big picture, the roster of voucher schools looks stronger now than at any point in the program’s past. Improvement deserves recognition. Now, if we can just see future results in line with this.

JS Online

Black Teens Are Fired When the Minimum Wage Rises

Two labor economists report that when the minimum wage increases, Black teens suffer disproportionate dismissals.

BET News

Obama-Voter Althouse Blasts Trump Resisters: You Don't Believe in Democracy

When I see the continuing shock and struggle to absorb the reality of Trump's presidency, I want to ask these people why they did not understand the people of their own country and why they do not accept the consequences of democracy? You don't believe in democracy if you only believe in it when someone you like wins. This is democracy, and these are your fellow citizens.

Althouse Blog