Wednesday roundup

Caroline Glick says that the appointments of Flynn and Mattis show that the new administration is serious about deep-sixing the Iran nuke "agreement," and also about being a real friend to Israel.

Don't believe the hooey you're coming across in some of these Obama-era-in-retrospect pieces about how the Most Equal Comrade and his nomenklatura have bequeathed a humming economy to the incoming bunch. What they've left are the fruits of planned decline:

Now they tell us.

A new report on the economy finds that productivity growth is at a 50-year low and that much of the positive talk about the nation's financial situation in the last election, much of it coming from the administration, was a lie.

The report from the U.S. Council on Competitiveness and Gallup finds that for many, the economy is in reverse despite claims that there is an active recovery ongoing, complete with new jobs.

Just one example: Wages peaked 17 years ago, in 1999.

"Conventional wisdom — as reported in many major newspapers and media — tells us the U.S. economy is 'recovering.' Well-meaning economists, academics and government officials use the term 'recovery' when discussing the economy, implying that growth is getting stronger. The study finds there is no recovery. Since 2007, U.S. GDP per capita growth has been 1," according to Gallup Chairman Jim Clifton.

"As this report makes clear," added Council President Deborah Wince-Smith, "productivity growth is in a serious multi-decade-long slump that is dangerously close to stalling completely." 

The executive summary hits the worst of the news.

"The people are right. The economy is not working well. But the problems did not start with the Great Recession. For decades, the nation's income, measured as GDP, has barely grown overall; on a per capita basis, median household income peaked in 1999; the subjective general health status of Americans has declined, even adjusting for the aging population; disability rates are higher; learning has stagnated; fewer new businesses are being launched; more workers are involuntarily stuck in part-time jobs or out of the labor force entirely; and the income ranks of grown children are no less tied to the income ranks of their parents," said the report titled No Recovery — An Analysis of Long-Term U.S. Productivity Decline.

Angela Merkel continues to get a clue about the shifting mood in Europe. Now she's calling for a burqua ban. 

Joy Pullman at The Federalist lists the first seven things Betsy DeVoss should do as Education Secretary: reverse the Most Equal Comrade's illegal actions, refuse to enforce vague statutes, bring in a whip-smart legal team, do a bureaucracy audit, audit the department's data handling, create a plan to eliminate her department, and refuse to preside over a federal vouchers program.

Some bracing plain speaking from Dennis Prager on Squirrel-Hair's supposed misogyny:

The evidence supports charges of insensitivity, boorishness, crassness, immaturity, and verbal impulsivity. But not misogyny.

Take the most infamous of the alleged proofs of Mr. Trump’s misogyny, his comments secretly recorded in 2005 in a private conversation with Access Hollywood host Billy Bush: “I’m automatically attracted to beautiful [women] — I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star they let you do it. You can do anything. . . . Grab them by the p***y. You can do anything.”

Why does that demonstrate misogyny? How is that hatred of women?

It’s crass, juvenile, sexually aggressive, improper, etc., etc. But in what way does it demonstrate hatred of women?

It doesn’t.

Us guys are capable of holding our female counterparts in multidimensional regard:

If sexually objectifying women makes men haters of women, then gay men hate men — because gay men sexually objectify men in exactly the same way that heterosexual men objectify women.

If you have a problem with this — and I can understand why people do — you need to take it up with God or Darwin. But this is how male sexual nature works — it objectifies the object of its sexual attraction — male or female.

The good news is that every healthy male is capable of both respecting women and sexually objectifying them.

Even Donald Trump.

As Leslie Gore observed, that's the way boys are.