Thursday afternoon roundup

Just about the time you start thinking, hey, jihad hasn't been on the radar screen for a few days, you get something like this:

Flight MS804 was travelling from Paris to Cairo when it vanished from radar 10 miles into Egyptian airspace at 00.30am GMT without making a distress call. 

Greek defence minister Panos Kammenos said the Airbus A320 made 'sudden swerves' in mid-air, lurching 90 degrees to the left then 360 degrees to the right. It then dropped from 37,000 feet to 15,000ft before the signal was lost at around 10,000 feet.

The revelation came as security experts, ministers and former air accident investigators said all the evidence pointed to the plane being targeted in a terrorist attack.

Ross Kaminsky at The American Spectator lets us in on the dialogue going on in his head these day:

 Anti-Trump: I just don’t see how I can, in good conscience, vote for Donald Trump. I think I’m going back to what I’ve done for most of my adult life, voting Libertarian for president. I like Gary Johnson quite a bit.

Pro-Trump: What a waste! It’s about time you realize that Donald Trump is what the people, or at least Republicans, want because they’re so angry with business as usual, the “establishment,” and generally by a GOP that has shown so little spine standing up to the many tyrannical acts, large and small, of the Obama administration.

AT: Although I’m independent, not Republican, I share their anger and agree with the diagnosis of the cancer that our Leviathan government has become on our nation, but Trump seems more like taking cyanide than chemotherapy.

PT: Let’s not exaggerate. If you want to talk about national political suicide, that’s Hillary Clinton, especially after eight years of Barack Obama. If we get Hillary, her Supreme Court nominee(s) will wreck what’s left of the Constitution and rule of law in the United States, we’ll never get rid of Obamacare, the national debt will continue to skyrocket, and while all that is going on we’ll have to hear her condescending screeching for four or eight years. You’ll want to kill yourself if you love your country or your sanity (the latter already dubious given this conversation).

AT: The problem for me is twofold: First, I have no idea if Mr. Trump actually believes anything — it doesn’t help that he often seems to believe two contradictory things in one speech and three in one day. Therefore I don’t know what he will do except that he seems strongly against free trade and against entitlement reform, each of which represents a way of thinking potentially as economically harmful, in both the short and long term, as anything Hillary is likely to accomplish. Second, I can easily imagine a wave of Republican victories in the 2018 mid-terms if Hillary is president and then a Republican unseating her in 2020 whereas I can imagine Trump destroying the GOP, losing both houses of Congress in 2018 and then the presidency (in fact, I can imagine him not running for re-election) in 2020. And if Dems get full control of the government again, as they had in 2009-2010, they won’t repeat Obama’s mistake of focusing all of their attention on one issue (health care) and neglecting to advance the rest of their left-wing agenda. They will then truly destroy the America that you and I love.

PT: You’re overthinking this. Even if you’re right that that’s a possibility, and I’m not saying it’s impossible, what is certain is the negative impact that Hillary Clinton will have. Again, I can’t overstate the importance of the Supreme Court — and even you have to believe that Trump would nominate a far better justice than Hillary would. She would massively expand the already-smothering regulatory state. She would destroy jobs through misguided anti-fossil fuel policies and a big hike in the federal minimum wage. And although it’s harder to measure, she would continue the most egregious part of the Obama legacy: his intentional fracturing of the American people along race and “class” lines; Obama and Clinton are both disciples of Saul Alinsky, a truly evil man who hated everything that the Declaration of Independence — and therefore this nation — stands for.

AT: I don’t disagree with that, but I just don’t know if it’s enough to get me to vote for a man who is an unprincipled populist nationalist with no understanding of basic economics or foreign policy or anything else that a president needs to understand. I hate to say it, but I sort of agree with Hillary Clinton’s characterization of Trump as a “loose cannon.” 

And so on. I could identify, big-time.

A WaPo poll reveals that nine in ten Native Americans don't give a diddly if the Washington Redskins have that name.

Supporters of Bernie Sanders - or, for that matter, Hillionaire - turn your gaze toward Venezuela and see the end product of your economic agenda.

And Bill DeBlasio burnishes his bona fides as a world-class nature-distortion jackboot:

We learned this week that Hizzonor Bill de Blasio has yet another plan to entrench the city in “transgender” warfare and make sure that business owners are made to toe the line on political correctness. Under this latest scheme, any business which greets someone using a pronoun not matching the gender (or lack thereof) the customer “identifies” as could face a stiff fine in court. No… I’m not even remotely kidding you. (Washington Times)

Greeting customers as “Mr.” or “Mrs.” — or even not using the pronoun “ze” or “zir” — could prove costly for New York City businesses under rules drafted by Mayor Bill de Blasio’s bureaucrats.

The Gotham mayor’s Commission on Human Rights says entities that fail to address customers by their preferred gender pronouns and titles are in violation of the law and could be subject to penalties of up to $250,000.

The commission issued a “legal enforcement guidance” for the New York City Human Rights Law, which now “requires employers and converted entities to use an individual’s preferred name, pronoun and title (e.g., Ms./Mrs.) regardless of the individual’s sex assigned at birth, anatomy, gender, medical history, appearance, or the sex indicated on the individual’s identification.”

So now New York City will regulate the speech of business owners and employees down to the level of punishing those who use standard, polite pronouns which have been accepted protocol for nearly as long as we’ve had language skills. 

"Orwellian" really no longer adequately describes it.

At NRO, Victor Davis Hanson catalogues the just-in-recent-months ways that the Most Equal Comrade has destabilized the world.

RIP Morley Safer. 

If you're into the-neighbors-are-doing-it excuses for something you're considering doing and need one to apply in the case of post-America electing a boorish thug as president, you may take comfort in the recent behavior of Canada's prime minister:

Progressive golden boy Justin Trudeau showed his authoritarian colors on Wednesday as he threw a temper tantrum in Canada's legislature, grabbing one member of Parliament and elbowing a female member in the breast. Why? Trudeau was upset that opposition MPs had taken a few moments longer than he liked to begin voting on a key piece of his legislative agenda.

Trudeau's Liberal government had made a motion to shut down debate on a bill that would allow assisted suicide in Canada. Opposition MPs on both sides of the issue claim the government bill is flawed and needs more debate and changes. When Trudeau said no, they stalled a little and that is all it took for him to fly into a fit of rage.

When Conservative and New Democrat MPs had stalled for a whole 46 seconds after the vote had been called to order, Trudeau got up from his seat, marched across the aisle and began manhandling other members of Canada's legislature.

He grabbed Conservative whip Gord Brown by the arm and in doing so the self-proclaimed feminist also elbowed New Democrat Ruth Ellen Brosseau in her breast, pushing her back into a desk. Trudeau didn't even pause to see if she was okay before marching Brown towards his seat.

He then returned to the opposition benches to yell at New Democrat members that were not moving fast enough, reportedly yelling at one point, "Get the f@*k out of my way."

Trudeau denied there was a problem before later offering an, "I'm sorry but..." apology. He left Parliament walking past reporters and smiling arrogantly while refusing to answer any questions about the incident.

Justin, dude, take a chill pill.