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April 2017

As the nation's opioid crisis continues to grow, some cities are taking dramatic steps to deal with its associated problems. Las Vegas has actually introduced vending machines which dispense clean syringes for free. The Daily Caller reports:
Syringe Vending Machines Hit Las Vegas Amid Heroin Crisis Las Vegas will get the nation’s first vending machine for drug syringes to combat spiking heroin deaths in the state and reduce the transmission of HIV.

Chris Matthews has invited liberals at the IRS to leak the audit status of President Trump's tax return. On this evening's Hardball, Matthews said: "we know there's no audit [of Trump.] Can't the IRS just make a statement, he's not under audit? Just make the announcement. By the way, that would be a good leak. Somebody at the IRS just leaking. I thought they were all liberals over there. Why doesn't somebody just leak it?" Pursuant to 26 US Code Sec. 7213, disclosing an individual's return information is "a felony punishable upon conviction by a fine in any amount not exceeding $5,000, or imprisonment of not more than 5 years, or both."

On the eve of the special election in Georgia's 6th district, news of President Trump's approval hitting 50% on Rasmussen's Presidential Tracking Poll is being blasted from the rafters by Drudge and retweeted by the President himself.  However, Rasmussen's appears to be an outlier, though Gallup has him up by two points at 41%. This is an important point because Georgia's 6th, Newt Gingrich's old district, only barely went for Trump last November, and the progressive Democrat, Jon Ossoff, began his campaign as a "Make Trump Furious" effort and in doing so, has intentionally made the special election a referendum on Trump.

As tension rise between America and North Korea, it appears that Russian state TV has decided to side with dictator Kim Jong Un. According to Bloomberg, the Kremlin's top TV guy Dmitry Kiselyov made this proclamation after calling President Donald Trump "just the kind of leader the world needed" a few weeks ago. Bloomberg reported:
In the latest sign of the Kremlin’s abrupt about-face on its erstwhile American hero, Kiselyov pronounced Trump “more dangerous” than his North Korean counterpart. “Trump is more impulsive and unpredictable than Kim Jong Un,” he told viewers of his prime-time Sunday “Vesti Nedelyi” program, which earlier this year carried paeans to Trump for his pledge to warm up relations with Russia.

Salma Hayek and John Lithgow teamed up for the upcoming Beatriz at Dinner. Billed as a dark comedy, the preview looks more like a parody found on Saturday Night Live than an actual movie meant to be taken somewhat seriously. The plotline of the dramatic comedy has been described thusly:

New Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch took his chair on the high court for the first time Monday and wasted no time making his voice heard. During his long confirmation process, Gorsuch told the Senate that he would not allow his personal beliefs to persuade his judicial interpretation.

On Sunday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared victory after a referendum vote gave him even more power with a slim 51% victory. But he has already received backlash from opposition groups and international monitors who found problems with the election. Erdogan even warned people not to fight the referendum outcome because "it's too late now."

In an interview with the Boston Globe, Sen. Elizabeth Warren claimed Sen. Mitch McConnell won't even say hello to her after she violated Senate rules during floor debate over the confirmation of Attorney General, Jeff Sessions. According to the Globe:
“I’ve spoken to him, but he has not spoken to me,” Warren said, laughing in a disbelieving way, shaking her head. “I say hello to Mitch every chance I get, and he turns his head.”

Today's Morning Joe had some good advice for Democrats if they want to start winning again, particularly at the House level. They need to stop imposing ideological purity tests on their candidates and nominate candidates who resonate culturally in swing districts. The good news for Republicans is that there is no sign that Dems will heed that wise counsel. To the contrary, Morning Joe was replete with indications that Dems have forgotten how to win, preferring to go down with their liberal guns a-blazing. Excerpts:

Marwan Barghouti is a terrorist, convicted of killing five Israeli civilians during the Second Intifada, and organizing much of the terror campaign through his control of the Tanzim group in the West Bank. Prof. Miriam Elman previously wrote a detailed profile of Barghouti, his terrorist past and political future, Terrorist Serving Multiple Life Sentences for Murder May be Next Palestinian President:
Barghouti (56)—a one-time peace activist who initially supported the Oslo Accords—served as the head of the Tanzim, one of Fatah’s armed terrorist factions, and was the founder of, and senior official in, the terrorist group known as the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade. Considered among the driving forces behind the bloody second intifada, he was convicted in 2004 for multiple murders and attempted murders.

The student editors at the Wellesley College (Hillary's alma mater) student newspaper wrote an editorial recently that rightly is getting much criticism and mockery. The Editorial is titled Free Speech is Not Violated At Wellesley.  The argument is that shutting down what the editors call "hate speech" is not a violation of free speech:
Many members of our community, including students, alumnae and faculty, have criticized the Wellesley community for becoming an environment where free speech is not allowed or is a violated right. Many outside sources have painted us as a bunch of hot house flowers who cannot exist in the real world. However, we fundamentally disagree with that characterization, and we disagree with the idea that free speech is infringed upon at Wellesley. Rather, our Wellesley community will not stand for hate speech, and will call it out when possible.

One of the enduring evils of the regressive insistence that all of society's ills are rooted in racism is their repeated attacks on children.  The latest is a relatively innocuous study that finds that infants are more friendly toward those races with which they are familiar and with which they associate a positive and loving experience. The flip side of this study erroneously concludes racism is at the root of these infants' inability to bond with or otherwise respond positively to people of races other than their own.  Note that it's not clear how the researchers determine what race the babies in the study believed themselves to be.

The progressive left's grudging admiration for the Tea Party is evidenced in their intense efforts to recreate our successes. I thoroughly enjoyed watching their various manifestations of "leftist Tea Parties" implode and sink into obscurity.  From the "coffee party" and "no labels party" to Occupy and Black Lives Matter, the progressive left has tried again and again to manufacture its own Tea Party equivalent.