Tuesday roundup

Dems had a retreat in West Virginia last weekend and it appears they now have thought the better of the idea of automatically filibustering any SCOTUS nominee that DJT puts forth. Seems the strategy now is to wait for a second vacancy (which will presumably be to replace a swing-vote or lefty justice) and then put up their fuss.

Re: acting AG Sally Yates and the immigration order: It was a dumb idea to leave her in that position, but it was a dumb idea for her to grandstand, given that the Constitution says that all executive power rests with the president. She had to go.

Once arguably America's premier character-formation organization for male adolescents, the Boy Scouts, long on their way to irrelevance, seal the deal with the new policy of allowing transgendered youth to join.

The California legislature is set to make the entire state a sanctuary for illegal aliens.

Strong - unhinged? - words from the head of the EU:

EU President Donald Tusk ("president" is a misnomer; Tusk wasn't elected by European voters, of course, because that's how Europe rolls) wrote a letter to 27 EU heads of state listing Donald Trump as a threat along with communist China, dictatorial Russia, and murderous radical Islam:

An increasingly, let us call it, assertive China, especially on the seas, Russia's aggressive policy towards Ukraine and its neighbours, wars, terror and anarchy in the Middle East and in Africa, with radical Islam playing a major role, as well as worrying declarations by the new American administration all make our future highly unpredictable.

Tusk went on to describe the United States under President Trump's leadership as the most difficult challenge for the EU:

Particularly the change in Washington puts the European Union in a difficult situation; with the new administration seeming to put into question the last 70 years of American foreign policy.

The Senate Health, Labor, Pensions and Education Committee votes to send Betsy DeVos's nomination to the full Senate.