[Hot Air] By late yesterday, the Daily Mail’s scoop on the whereabouts of Ghislaine Maxwell began looking a bit shaky. This morning, however, CBS News claims to have confirmed that Jeffrey Epstein’s "main facilitator" has hidden herself in a Massachusetts mansion ‐ at least until very recently. They sent a crew to the enclave of Manchester-by-the-Sea, where residents recognize Maxwell as the person haunting a mansion of late:
CBS News has confirmed with a nearby property manager that British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell was recently living at a secluded mansion in the small New England beach town Manchester-by-the-Sea and going by the names "G" or "G Max." Maxwell is accused of overseeing Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged sex trafficking ring and has kept a low profile since his death. ...
The nearby property manager we spoke to says Borgerson and Maxwell were a couple, and they saw them running together every morning. Maxwell has not been charged with a crime and previously denied the allegations against her.
As my favorite true-life TV detective often says ... well, my my my. That will make it easy for prosecutors to find "G-Max," I suppose, if she’s still there. That seems pretty doubtful, especially after the events of the last few days. Bloomberg’s also skeptical about the present status of Maxwell, reporting today that her "trail has gone cold":
[Babylon Bee] NUUK, GREENLAND‐There have been rumors that President Trump was considering buying Greenland, and Trump has now confirmed those rumors, revealing that he sees it as a great moneymaking opportunity if the U.S. purchases the world’s largest island, fixes it up, and then sells it at a much higher price.
"Look at it; it’s prime real estate," Trump told the press. "It’s on the very desirable Upper West Side -- you know, of the Prime Meridian -- and if we just modernize it a bit, that’s going to be some valuable property. And I’m going to split the profits from selling it with the American people, 60/40."
Trump says his first plan will be to get rid of the giant glacier in the middle of Greenland. "That used to be popular, but it’s out of style now," he explained. He plans to replace it all with "ultra-fancy" hardwood floors. In addition, he plans to maybe put up some shiplap, add an island, and upgrade the bathrooms. He's looking at opening it up into more of an "open concept" feel with some farmhouse sinks for a more rustic feel. The president has reportedly hired Chip and Joanna Gaines to help with the upgrades. They previously worked with him to put some shiplap up on the southern border wall.
Democrats, however, are opposed, as they are usually against all of Trump’s awesome schemes, like his tax cuts and his Robot Force -- a fighting force made entirely of robots. "I don’t know if I trust the market to not collapse soon," Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said. "Plus, with the sheer volume of hardwood floors he’s talking, we’d basically have to deforest all of Brazil."
Trump is undaunted, though, and was last seen at his local credit union applying for a loan pre-approval so he’ll be ready to buy Greenland from "Norway or Finland or whatever."
#2
What next? Transatlantic vendetta:
A bid for New York by Margrethe.
"She sez she's a Danish..."
"Well, isn't that heimish!"
"... and just like the Dutch, only better."
[The Federalist] I am an ethics professor, and I carry a concealed handgun in the classroom. In the event of a mass shooting, I am the first line of defense between my students and an attacker. I refuse to let myself and my students be victims.
I’m sure many of my fellow professors would disagree with my actions. In fact, many would probably brand me as a traitor to academia for admitting such a thing. For them, it is inconceivable that a member of the intelligentsia ‐ an ethics professor, of all people ‐ could support the right to carry a so-called instrument of death.
So in what follows, let me make the moral case for campus carry. Those wanting a more rigorous statement of my argument may be interested in reading one of my academic journal articles on the topic.
THE MORAL CASE FOR CAMPUS CARRY
Campus carry is simply an extension of our natural right of self-defense. Our right to life follows us wherever we go, so the right to defend our lives must also accompany us. Whether I am at home, in my car, at work, or in the classroom, I possess the absolute and unrelenting right to defend myself against unjust aggression. Because firearms enhance that right, there exists a strong presumption in favor of being allowed to own and carry a firearm as I go about my daily business.
That presumption may sometimes be overcome (such as in courthouses, prisons, or airports), but only if the government assumes the special responsibility of protecting those citizens whom it disarms through the coercive power of the law. In other words, if the government is going to tell us we can’t carry guns in a specific area, thus impairing our ability to defend ourselves, it must assume a special responsibility to protect us. It must serve the function our guns would provide had we been allowed to carry them.
An analogy might help illustrate this point. Suppose I push you into deep water as part of a swimming lesson. Because I have intentionally put you into a position of increased vulnerability, I owe it to you to make sure you do not drown. Likewise, if the government requires us to disarm ourselves before entering a specific area, it knowingly puts us in a position of increased vulnerability. It must therefore assume the special responsibility of making up for the gap it has created by increasing protective measures.
[American Conservative] AKRON, Ohio‐Rolling Acres Mall in Akron opened in 1975. I was three years old.
Some of my earliest childhood memories are of going to that mall. The mall had only been there for two years, but to a five year old in 1977, it was as permanent and impressive as the pyramids of Egypt.
The mall was huge: two levels, over one million square feet, four anchor department stores, and 140 individual stores. Our family would go to York Steak House for dinner, buy our clothes at O’Neils, buy hardware at Sears, and purchase hi-fidelity stereophonic sound at Radio Shack.
The mall was a center of community and commerce. In the 1970s and 1980s, a family trip, or a 16-year-old’s solo teenage voyage to the mall, was an iconic all-American experience and a rite of passage.
In the mid-1980s, it would have been inconceivable to think that this still practically brand-new mall’s best days were already behind it.
But by the early-1990s, the mall’s fortunes had begun to rapidly fade. And by the mid-2000s, it was nearly empty. The power was turned off in 2008. Soon afterward, the mall went viral on the internet as the ur-example of retail apocalypse and suburban decline.
The hollowed-out husk of what was once a temple to commerce, familial bonding, and teenage freedom rapidly became a post-apocalyptic casualty of late capitalism and a dangerous nuisance. The mall bounced from one absentee-owned LLC to another. The owner(s) stopped paying property taxes.
A man was killed by electrocution trying to steal copper pipe from the mall. An infamous serial killer dumped the body of one of his victims at the site. Photographers, urban explorers, and curiosity seekers descended upon the ruins, drawn by the site’s fall from grace. (Photographer Seph Lawless’ compelling and haunting images of the mall were captured in his book "Autopsy of America.")
#5
Malls still exist all over southern california. To survive a mall has to offer stores folks actually want to shop in, not stores filled with stuff Amazon has for cheaper.
[Washington Examiner] CNN host and analyst Chris Cillizza criticized the 1867 purchase of Alaska by the United States in a Friday opinion article detailing the potential problems if the U.S. pursued the purchase of Greenland.
"One of the last times the United States bought land from a foreign country was in 1867, when Seward orchestrated the purchase of Alaska from the Russians for $7.2 million," Cillizza wrote. "It didn't work out so well -- and has gone down as 'Seward's Folly' in the history books."
On Friday evening, the language of the article was adjusted to remove the sentence, "It didn't work out so well." The new version stated that the purchase of Alaska was "heavily criticized."
#1
*Sigh* I can see arguments that our entanglement in the Philippines was a bad idea. Or Puerto Rico. But, Alaska? At this point posing the counter-factual is like trying to make eggs out of a 3-egg cheese omelette.
#2
Illiterate talking heads never heard or read of gold and oil.
* Alaska does not have a state income tax.
* Alaska does not have a sales tax, though some areas like Wasilla do have a small sales tax.
* Alaska does have property taxes, but there are exclusions and incentives for seniors.
* Of course there is also the Alaska Permanent Fund, essentially a rebate to Alaska residents that is typically over $1,000 per year.
You can understand why confiscatory socialists/commies hate it.
[Breitbart] Thursday on his nationally syndicated program, conservative talker Rush Limbaugh warned Wednesday market turmoil was a sign of things to come for the 2020 election.
According to Limbaugh, there could be an effort shortly before the 2020 presidential election to create a sense of fear about the economy and the potential for a recession to prevent President Donald Trump’s reelection.
#2
I think it is more the fact we are hyper sensitive to the extended length of this economic expansion and knowing that a 2/10 inversion is/will be the eventual final nail in its coffin.
#3
After all the stuff that's come out over the last few years about the NSA, the IRS and all the other scandals (Epstein being the latest), you have to be a tinfoil hatter not to believe in conspiracy theories.
#5
I think he's wrong. The market got jittery because journalists are idiots and were reporting things that they suspected, not the reality. Market corrected the following day when teh true report came out.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.