Kenneth N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics

The classic neorealist text on international relations, still in print.

At Amazon, Kenneth N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics.

A Sense of Uncertainty Grips the World

Such drama.

It's just a new administration. We had an election.

You'd think the world was coming to an end, or something.

At the New York Times, "As Trump Era Arrives, a Sense of Uncertainty Grips the World":

The Germans, angry. The Chinese, furious. Leaders of NATO, nervous, while at the European Union, alarmed https://t.co/APxXCr3dBZ

— Liebano Saenz (@liebano) January 17, 2017

LONDON — The Germans are angry. The Chinese are downright furious. Leaders of NATO are nervous, while their counterparts at the European Union are alarmed.

Just days before he is sworn into office, President-elect Donald J. Trump has again focused his penchant for unpredictable disruption on the rest of the world. His remarks in a string of discursive and sometimes contradictory interviews have escalated tensions with China while also infuriating allies and institutions critical to America’s traditional leadership of the West.

No one knows where exactly he is headed — except that the one country he is not criticizing is Russia and its president, Vladimir V. Putin. For now. And that he is an enthusiastic cheerleader of Brexit and an unaffiliated Britain. For now.

Mr. Trump’s unpredictability is perhaps his most predictable characteristic. The world is accustomed to his provocative Twitter messages, but is less clear about whether his remarks represent meaningful new policy guidelines, personal judgments or passing whims. In the interviews, Mr. Trump described the European Union as “basically a vehicle for Germany” and predicted that the bloc would probably see other countries follow Britain’s example and vote to leave.

Mr. Trump also said Germany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel, had made a “catastrophic mistake” in allowing refugees to pour into Europe.

The barrage of inflammatory comments in joint interviews published Sunday and Monday in Britain and Germany elicited alarm and outrage in Europe, even as Ms. Merkel dryly characterized Mr. Trump’s positions as nothing new.

“They have been known for a while — my positions are also known,” Ms. Merkel said Monday in Berlin. “I think we Europeans have control of our destiny.”

Her clipped response came as officials and analysts struggled with how to interpret Mr. Trump’s remarks, as well as how to react to them.

Some argued that the president-elect’s words should be regarded as tactical, intended merely to keep his options open. But nearly everyone agreed that Mr. Trump had made trouble, especially in criticizing Ms. Merkel, given her importance as a figure of stability in Europe and her campaign for re-election later this year.

For good measure, Mr. Trump had also infuriated China by using an interview on Friday with The Wall Street Journal to again question China’s longstanding One China policy. It holds that Taiwan is an inalienable part of the mainland...

So, everybody wants Trump to play by the international system's Marquess of Queensberry Rules.

It ain't happening.

More.

Also, "As Inauguration Nears, Trump Keeps World Leaders on Edge."

Jackie Johnson's Cloudy Skies Forecast

It was perfect weather today.

I went skateboarding, heh.

Here's Ms. Jackie, back in black!

Jerry Orbach in Dewar's White Label Scotch Advertisement

Just saw the photo on Twitter, and then Googled.

At the New York Times, February 17, 1989, "THE MEDIA BUSINESS: Advertising; 20 Years Of Dewar's Achievers":

PORTNOY'S COMPLAINT pic.twitter.com/VpbePgPiz1

— Sarah Marshall (@Remember_Sarah) April 9, 2016

''IT made me a Dewar's drinker,'' Jerry Orbach said yesterday, recalling his appearance 20 years ago as a young actor in the first Dewar's Profile for White Label Scotch. ''Any publicity is good when they spell your name right.''

Mr. Orbach was the first of 85 young men and women to appear in the ad, now one of the longest-running campaigns in the United States and a triumph for its creator, Leo Burnett U.S.A., the Chicago-based agency.

As it did for Mr. Orbach, the ad has persuaded many people to drink White Label. ''It helped the success of the brand in a soft market for distilled spirits,'' said Henry Yaris, United States business manager for Dewar's, ''and Dewar's became the leading brand of Scotch in the country.''

More.

Black Trump Supporter Walks Around New York City for 10 Hours, Discovers Leftist Intolerance (VIDEO)

Via Project Veritas, "Watch what happens when a PVA Journalist walks through the streets of Manhattan wearing a Trump T-shirt and hat."

Because leftists are so tolerant.

Lindsey Pelas #MLKDAY Selfie

At Drunken Stepfather, "LINDSAY PELAS FISHNET SELFIE OF THE DAY."

That's an unbelievable woman.

Anastasia Ashley Surfing Iceland (VIDEO)

Via Drunken Stepfather, "ANASTASIA ASHLEY IN ICELAND OF THE DAY."

Watch, "Anastasia Ashley in Iceland."

PREVIOUSLY: "Anastasia Ashley for Maxim."

Tucker Carlson and Jehmu Greene (VIDEO)

On Twitter, "Tucker Destroys Jehmu Greene: “Why Do You Always Bring It Back To Race?” (VIDEO)."

Also, "‘Unable to answer a question!’: Tucker Carlson clashes with Jehmu Greene (Twitchy)."

Watch, at Fox News, "Political strategist says suspicion of Russian hacking in the election was an attack on US democracy, agrees with Rep. John Lewis that Trump's presidency is illegitimate and sounds off on running for DNC chair..."

Not Much Legitimate About the Sore Loser Democrats

From Adriana Cohen, at the Boston Herald:

Since Donald Trump’s unexpected victory, Democrats have been trying to delegitimize his historic upset.

U.S. Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), who sent shock waves through the media echo chamber this weekend when he said in an NBC interview, “I don’t see this president-elect as a legitimate president. I think the Russians participated in helping this man get elected. And they helped destroy the candidacy of Hillary Clinton.” Former Clinton campaign spokesman Brian Fallon went on CNN Friday to chime in as well.

Talk about a snow job.

Clinton didn’t lose the election due to alleged Russian hacking. She lost because she was a flawed candidate who ran a bad campaign. But facts always get in the way when you’re an out-of-touch liberal trying to play the blame game...

More.

Also at NewsBusters, via Memeorandum, "Reporters Plead with MLK III to Attack Trump; Did Lewis Tweets Shake You ‘To Your Core?’."

Oh brother.

Taylor Branch, Parting the Waters

*BUMPED.*

At Amazon, Taylor Branch, Parting the Waters: America in the King Years, 1954-63.

Trumpian Horrors

At People's Cube, "Trumpian Horrors Magazine."

Heh, "Trumpian Horrors." https://t.co/eVRZV4QLU9 pic.twitter.com/Kn1Owl6EDZ

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) January 16, 2017

Farm Girl Jen, 50-Year-Old Fitness Sensation with Rippling Abs, Become YouTube Star

She's in excellent, envious shape!

At London's Daily Mail, "Fifty-year-old farmer becomes a YouTube sensation after revealing the VERY unusual secret to her rock hard abs (and it's helping her rake in $100,000 a year): Jennifer King, from North Carolina, is known as Farm Girl Jen online."

David Hines 'Days of Rage' Tweetstorm

Okay, following-up from last night, "Watch for the Left to Become Even More Ruthless."

I found the thread I was talking about: It's David Hines, and it's now Storified, "DAYS OF RAGE, pt 1+pt2: The first and second tweetstorms about Bryan Burrough's DAYS OF RAGE and political violence in 2017."

Let's not mince words: the United States of America is currently engaged in a cold Civil War.

— David Hines (@hradzka) January 14, 2017

BONUS: At the Other McCain, "Marxists Shut Down Campus Speech — Is Trump Inauguration Their Next Target?"

FLASHBACK: Barry Rubin, Silent Revolution

Since I'm blogging about all these violent crazy leftists, who worry me sometimes, here's a flashback to the late Barry Rubin's excellent book.

At Amazon, Silent Revolution: How the Left Rose to Political Power and Cultural Dominance.

Brian H. Fishman, The Master Plan

*BUMPED.*

A new book on Islamic jihad.

At Amazon, from Brian H. Fishman, The Master Plan: ISIS, al-Qaeda, and the Jihadi Strategy for Final Victory.

Watch for the Left to Become Even More Ruthless

Following-up, "American Radicals and the Change We Could Believe In."

I saw this long series of tweets, many with long individual threads, yesterday at Kurt Schlicter's. A couple of folks were linking Bryan Burrough, Days of Rage: America's Radical Underground, the FBI, and the Forgotten Age of Revolutionary Violence, and suggesting that some similar "days of rage" might well be in our (near?) future.

Watch for the left to become even more ruthless toward anyone who refuses to maintain their line of absolute hostility toward our President.

— Kurt Schlichter (@KurtSchlichter) January 14, 2017

I need to troll back through Schlicter's feed for some of the specific tweets. It seems some tweeps were even suggesting that there's current law enforcement and intelligence chatter to the effect of forthcoming political violence. But I'm not sure, so I'll come back with more if I can find it.

American Radicals and the Change We Could Believe In

As Obama's about to depart from office, there's virtually no signs that Democrats and progressives are tacking toward the center.

I spent a lot of time attending events on campus after the election, because as noted I genuinely feel for the students scared their parents will be deported. (I think folks should have information, at least so they'll understand how due process works and where to obtain legal assistance.) In one of the last ones I attending, the president of my union, with whom I've had my battles in the past, appeared positively energized by all the opportunities for radical left activism the coming Trump administration was likely to afford. And as I troll around on Twitter, especially clicking around on radical feminist feeds, etc., I'm forwarded to more and more sites and resources that throw off the same vibe. And American politics is so polarized I'm confident that unless Donald Trump has some very substantial successes, especially on the economy and jobs, he's very liable to becoming a one term president.

In any case, I read this piece at the Nation when it came out in early December, but never got around to posting it. If you check Katrina vanden Heuval's Twitter feed you'll get an idea of how febrile the radical left has become. (I'm also not discounting the possibility of political violence, but I try to put the thought of assassination out of my mind. It's just too horrifying, and I have a feeling with all the things coming down, there are some on the left who've seriously contemplated it.)

In any case, it's Eric Foner, who's now retired as a professor of history at Columbia:

Eric Foner on Obama -- American Radicals and the Change We Could Believe In via @thenation https://t.co/lPEBbzWHCL

— Katrina vandenHeuvel (@KatrinaNation) January 11, 2017

The Great Hate-Crime Hysteria

From Eric Felten, at the Weekly Standard, "Untruth and Consequences":

Impressed with this thoughtful look at the currently raging Hate War. https://t.co/85SWU4pZyA!

— Crazy Pastor (@thecrazypastor) January 15, 2017

Scottish teenager Kate Hume was no stranger to tragedy. By the time the great European powers hurtled into war at the end of July 1914, her older brother had already been dead more than two years: Violinist John “Jock" Hume was a member of Wallace Hartley's eight-man orchestra that had played on the deck of the sinking Titanic.

Just a month and a half into the Great War she received news even more devastating.

At the office in Dumfries where she worked as a "clerkess," Kate found herself with a pair of letters. The first had the signature of her older sister, about whom the last Kate knew was that she was working as a nurse in the English town of Huddersfield. The letter read: "Dear Kate, This is to say good-bye. Have not long to live. Hospital has been set on fire. Germans cruel. .  .  . My right breast has been taken away. .  .  . Good-bye. Grace."

The first letter was explained by the other, from one of Grace's fellow nurses, a Miss Mullard. "I was with your sister when she died," the letter said, explaining they had been together at a field hospital set up near the front at Vilvorde, in Belgium. The Huns attacked and burned the hospital, according to Nurse Mullard, killing over a thousand wounded men, including through beheadings. As for the nurses, the ones the Germans captured were grotesquely violated before being murdered. Grace was among them: "She endured great agony," the letter went on, detailing that counterattacking British Tommies had "caught two German soldiers .  .  . cutting off her left breast, her right one having been already cut off."

Kate shared the letters with the press. The story caused a sensation—covered not only in local Scottish papers such as the Dumfries Standard, but in London papers including the Pall Mall Gazette, the Globe, the Westminster Gazette, the Evening Standard, and everywhere in-between. The headline in the London Star was typical: "A NURSE'S TRAGEDY: Dumfries Girl the Victim of Shocking Barbarity."

With such widespread reporting, it didn't take long for Grace Hume to learn of her own grisly death. She saw placards up at the newsstand advertising the big headline "Terrible Murder of Huddersfield Nurse." She bought the local Post and, astonished by what she read, wired her father: "Reports untrue. Safe in Huddersfield."

Kate, it turned out, had made the whole thing up.

Jump forward a century and the case of the Mutilated Nurse has a newfound relevance. For we are in a new age of hoaxes, with frequent tales of Trump-inspired atrocities that have unraveled, as did so many of the stories of atrocities committed in WWI. Understanding the propaganda of the Great War may help us understand the motives and methods of the modern propaganda in what we might call the Hate War.

The Hate War got going in earnest in the immediate aftermath of the election with a raft of reports of malicious Trumpkins taunting and attacking young Muslim women, targeting them for wearing traditional religious head-coverings.

One of the most distressing of the hijab stories was that of Yasmin Seweid, who told police she was assaulted on the New York subway by marauding Trump supporters while fellow passengers did nothing, said nothing. The perpetrators were described as three drunk white men talking about Trump. "They were surrounding me from behind and they were like, 'Oh look, it's an f-ing terrorist,' " the 18-year-old Baruch College student told a CBSNewYork reporter. They pulled at her bag, breaking the strap. She said she begged to be left alone, only to be met with a torrent of abuse: "They kept saying 'you don't belong here, get out of this country, go back to your country.' " The men grabbed at her hijab, and her fellow straphangers, she suggested, were, in their cowardice, complicit: "Everyone was looking, no one said a thing, everyone just looked away."

The police didn't look away. They combed through the subway's security video looking for the men Seweid had described. They found none. Though the case was hugely publicized, no witnesses were found. Then, with the police looking to interview her again, Seweid went AWOL. When she finally turned up, "Suspicion," the New York Daily News reported, "went through the roof." Facing continued questioning by skeptical detectives, the young woman admitted she had been lying all along. The whole thing was a fraud. She was arraigned, charged with making a false report.

(If one thinks that a trifle harsh for a bit of youthful fibbing, it's worth noting that Britain, in the midst of war with Germany, prosecuted and convicted Kate Hume for her lies.)

Seweid's was hardly the only hijab hoax...

Of course not.

In fact, I can't think of a single confirmed hate crime committed by Trump supporters against Muslims or anything other progressive demographic group.

It's been all lies. Leftist lies.

But keep reading.

Matt Ryan and the Falcons Look Nearly Unstoppable

Lindsey Thiry yesterday, in real time, as well as Sports Illustrated after the win:

This Falcons team looks absolutely unstoppable.

— Lindsey Thiry (@LindseyThiry) January 15, 2017

If the Seahawks couldn't stop Matt Ryan and the Falcons, who can? (by @jjones9) https://t.co/rsBNzvQiOw pic.twitter.com/KpdZh4rMex

— Sports Illustrated (@SInow) January 15, 2017

Sunday Cartoons

At Flopping Aces, "Sunday Funnies."



Also, at Theo's, "Cartoon Roundup..."

Cartoon Credit: Legal Insurrection, "Branco Cartoon – Elmer Dud (CNN/BuzzFeed Fake News)."