YATES: LATEST PERFIDIOUS FACE OF THE LAWLESS LEFT

     The dangerous defiance of the lawless left continues to subvert the efforts of the Trump Administration to restore a semblance of sanity to America's immigration policy. 

     A pinch-faced Obama holdover at the Justice Department, one Sally Yates, has exploited and betrayed her temporary trust as Acting Attorney General (pending the Democrat-delayed confirmation of Jeff Sessions as permanent AG) to gain 15 minutes of infamy through an act of pure dereliction of duty and defiance of law.

     President Trump, unlike so many elected officials of both parties, has kept his campaign promises by signing a series of executive orders putting into effect various policies and programs that could be effectuated without legislation.  Among the most prominent of these was to suspend entry of aliens from seven terrorist-harboring nations pending the thorough vetting of their backgrounds that the Obama administration declined to perform.

     The constitutionality and legality of the suspension/vetting order has been thoroughly demonstrated elsewhere by a variety of legal experts.  More to the point here, the order's legal and constitutional validity was vetted and approved by the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC), the elite Justice Department office specifically charged with the responsibility of reviewing Executive Branch orders, policies, programs, and proposed legislation for legality and constitutionality.  The author of Splashing Rocks served as Senior Counsel at OLC in one stretch of his legal career, and so is especially knowledgeable of the points that follow.

                                             

          Dismissed DOJ Caretaker Yates:  Subversive Face of the Lawless Left

     Ms. Yates was not content merely to defy the President and abandon her duties in refusing to defend the immigration order.  With the typical melodramatics and self-aggrandizement of the leftist hack that she is, Yates issued an outrageously political letter applauding herself for "stand[ing] for what is right" and "seek[ing] justice" -- in a blatantly partisan declaration that the President was doing the opposite.

     Yates actions and statements were dishonest, lawless, and profoundly irresponsible.  She richly deserved to be among the first Obama holdover cadres to receive an emphatic "You're fired!" from the  President.  But there is a significant additional twist to this episode which sharply underscores the utter lawlessness and hypocrisy of the political lawyers of the Democrat Left.

     Just before the various controversies over the immigration order came to a head, critics on the left were suggesting that it would be irresponsible for President Trump to issue executive orders that were vetted only by White House Counsel without any clearance by the above-described OLC.  For example, Democrat/Liberal Walter Dellinger, who headed the OLC during the Clinton administration, recently asserted that it is "essential that any order issued by the President be reviewed for lawfulness by the career lawyers at the Office of Legal Counsel. That is not a task that can be left to White House staff if we are going to be a nation of laws."

     In the case of the suspension/vetting order, the Trump Administration did exactly what Mr. Dellinger recommended:  the order was vetted and cleared by OLC for legality and constitutionality.  Yet Acting AG Yates -- who is an Obama political holdover whose position is merely that of a "caretaker" -- chose to disregard the OLC clearance and refused to defend the order on inarticulate justice policy grounds and because she was "not convinced" that it was lawful.  But to paraphrase Walter Dellinger, "that is not a task to be left to" a politically appointed and motivated caretaker/hack like Sally Yates "if we are going to be a nation of laws."

     First, if Yates was "not convinced" by the OLC opinion, she should have been.  She is simply unqualified to second guess OLC on a constitutional law issue, let alone where OLC's opinion rested on such well-established legal and historical precedent. 

     As I can personally attest, OLC is an extremely selective office that hires only the most highly qualified attorneys.  Virtually all OLC attorneys graduated near the top of their class from one of the nation's most elite law schools and then proceeded to a clerkship on a U.S. Court of Appeals.  It is a prestigious proving ground for Supreme Court Justices, including William Rehnquist, Antonin Scalia, and Samuel Alito.

     Yates got her law degree from barely mid-rank University of Georgia Law School, had no judicial clerkship, and has no apparent standing as a legal scholar.  She would have been lucky to be granted an interview at OLC, let alone to be hired there.  She was in her role as the Acting AG only as a ministerial "caretaker" until Jeff Sessions would be confirmed as Attorney General.  Yet this politically appointed caretaker had the audacity to make the radical and extraordinary step of dismissing OLC's opinion (not to mention prior DOJ approvals of comparable suspension orders by the Carter and Obama administrations) and trashing the President's order because this second-rate lawyer was "not convinced" it was constitutional.

     The purported policy and "justice" grounds on which Yates declined to defend the order are even more outrageous and insupportable.  Whatever authority an Acting Attorney General might have to question a presidential action on strictly legal grounds, she has no standing to second-guess the policy behind a presidential order -- let alone one involving the President's authority over national security, foreign affairs, and border control.  An executive order is law.  For an acting Attorney General to decline to defend or enforce it is not only a dereliction of duty, but a lawless and irresponsible act bordering on treachery.

     Yet it is not entirely surprising that a Democrat Attorney General, acting or otherwise, would arbitrarily reject a valid OLC legal opinion for partisan political reasons and personal aggrandizement.  This is merely the latest manifestation of the Democratic Left's scornful disregard for the rule of law when it interferes with their political designs.

     Early in the first Obama administration, Congress was considering enactment of a bill (the DC Voting Rights Act, or DCVRA) that would authorize the District of Columbia to have a seat in the House of Representatives.  The Constitution, however, expressly and repeatedly states that only States may be represented in the House (and the Senate).  Consequently, a constitutional amendment is required to give DC a voting Representative in Congress.  Therefore, in attempting to authorize such a DC Representative through simple legislation, the DCVRA was patently unconstitutional.

     OLC had previously issued a formal opinion during the latter Bush Administration that an earlier version of the DCVRA was patently unconstitutional (it was drafted by yours truly).  Confident that the Obama Justice Department would not let the mere Constitution stand in the way, however, radical proponents of DC representation reintroduced the bill promptly after Obama's election.  To its great credit, however, the Obama appointees at OLC upheld the prior opinion that the DCVRA was unconstitutional.  Acting Assistant AG for OLC David Barron, now a Court of Appeals Judge, appears to have been responsible for the ruling.  OLC had little honest choice, however, since the bill's unconstitutionality was so glaringly apparent that a contrary opinion would have seriously undercut OLC's hard-earned reputation of rigorous, nonpartisan integrity in issuing its legal opinions.

    Foreshadowing Ms. Yates' more recent lawlessness, Obama's radical leftist Attorney General, Eric Holder, showed as little deference to OLC's constitutional expertise as he typically did to the Constitution itself.  Holder not only rejected the OLC opinion, he completely circumvented longstanding DOJ practice and precedent in order to assure that there would be no Department questioning of the patently unconstitutional DCVRA. 

     To Holder, securing a House seat for the solidly Democratic and overwhelmingly black District of Columbia was far more important than obeying the unmistakable constitutional requirement that only States could be represented in Congress.  So he dispensed with the usual Department opinion on whether the bill was constitutional, and instead redirected the bill to an attorney of his choice in the Solicitor General's office, and altered the issue to whether the bill was defensible, whether or not it was constitutional in fact. 

     Needless to say, Holder obtained the desired "clearance," and the unconstitutional DCVRA proceeded to Congress with the Obama Administration's fraudulent imprimatur.  To this day, the OLC opinion that Holder rejected has been kept secret and withheld from disclosure in defiance of both congressional and FOIA requests.  Obviously, Holder did not want an opinion that demonstrated the duplicity of his actions to see the light of day.  Fortunately, this unconstitutional atrocity was sidetracked and killed by procedural obstacles unrelated to its constitutionality.  Thanks to Mr. Trump's election, it is unlikely to see the light of day again -- unless it is resurrected like some legislative vampire by another anti-constitutional Democratic administration we can all hope will never arise.

     Nonetheless, the pattern of politicized lawlessness established by the likes of Sally Yates and Eric Holder should be a warning to all who support the efforts of the Trump Administration to restore a standard of responsible law enforcement in the wake of the disastrous legal carnage of the Obama regime.  Both Yates and Holder wrongfully rejected clearly correct OLC opinions in order to further the partisan goals and campaigns of the Democratic Left.  These lawless Democrat radicals -- especially the lawless radical lawyers -- will stop at nothing, least of all the constraints of the Constitution and the rule of law, in their fanatical efforts to subvert the President's efforts to make America great, secure, and safe again.

    

GOVERNMENT BARRIERS SUPPRESSED INAUGURAL CROWDS

     The last few days have witnessed a petty and partisan media campaign to denigrate and belittle the enthusiastic crowds that attended President Trump's inauguration festivities.  Wielding various forms of photographic and statistical "evidence," the media banshees went to great lengths to demonstrate that Obama's first inauguration drew larger crowds than Trump's -- a question of no real interest to the public.

     Then, when President Trump's supporters understandably pushed back with counter-evidence (one obvious point is that Obama's crowds were artificially inflated by the hordes of Democrat federal workers who live in the DC area), the MSM pounced on them for pursuing such a petty issue -- the very issue the media snipers raised in the first place!

     But before this controversy gives way to matters of greater moment, Splashing Rocks will now get to the heart and truth of the matter -- which has heretofore escaped the focus of the MSM.

     The debate has mistakenly focused on the size of the crowds who were actually able to attend the ceremonies and parade.  But in light of the extreme government obstruction of access to these events, the proper measure is how many people came into town attempting to attend the events. 

                                                   

                 The Long and Winding Line to the Trump Inaugural . . .

     The fact is that the already large and enthusiastic crowds attending the Trump inauguration events would have been far larger if many thousands (like me) had not been prevented from gaining access to those events by a perverse array of government barriers.

     SR can testify firsthand to all this, because I was among the frustrated citizens who were stalled in miles of security lines and shunted from barrier to barrier and fence to fence in their vain efforts to gain timely access to the inaugural events. 

                                              
                                                 

                     . . . stretched endlessly on near L'Enfant Plaza

     To its great credit, though, the pro-Trump crowd retained its high spirits and enthusiasm despite all this.  But many thousands, like SR, went home early rather than spend more hours in the "long and winding lines" that the government's exaggerated (or deliberately designed?) security measures necessitated.

     SR came into town on Metro's Orange Line, hoping to decamp at one of the stations relatively convenient to the events -- Federal Triangle, Smithsonian, or Navy Memorial.  But no, all of those stations were closed for security reasons -- what proved to be the universal justification for the wall of obstruction that enmeshed the entire sector of the National Mall and Pennsylvania Avenue.

     Instead, would-be attendees were shunted to the L'Enfant Plaza station, three full blocks south of the Mall and still further from the Capital West Lawn inauguration site. 

     There, they emerged to see an enormous line of people, some  three or four abreast, the end of which was nowhere in sight, or anywhere near it. Requests for assistance in finding where one could get into the line were met with befuddled shrugs.  No one really knew where the line ended, and for good reason:  the line was not straight, but labyrinthian, like some kind of sadistic corn maze that turned first one way, and then another, only to turn again on itself.  And each segment in the seemingly endless turns was long -- very long. 

    After an interminable period with only slight forward movement, SR joined a young couple next to him in leaving the line to follow a tip they'd received of a shorter or faster-moving line closer to the Smithsonian Institute.  But here one merely moved from the Scylla of long lines to the Charybdis of cement barriers and meshed security fences.  The cement barriers running east-west adjacent to the Mall seemed endless.  Further, in order to move north toward the Smithsonian and the Mall, the barriers forced one to detour for several blocks South before turning back north.

     In short, the federal government had erected a dystopian labyrinth of lines, barriers, and fences that made it nearly impossible for all but the early arrivals to reach even the outer aprons of the Mall.  By the time SR was able to reach the far west edge of the Mall -- from which the West Lawn ceremonial platform was not even visible -- the ceremony was over.  All that remained was a replay of the lovely teenage soprano, Jackie Evancho, beautifully singing the National Anthem on the jumbotron.

     SR's attempt to get even remotely near the parade route on Pennsylvania Avenue were equally, if not more, frustrating.  All attempts to cut through to a point anywhere near the parade were met with more cement barriers, fences, or stern guards directing one to the end of another line that, again, was nowhere in sight.

     Along with thousands like him, SR gave up and headed back to the Metro.  The platform at L'Enfant Plaza station was full of early departees who had simply tired of waiting in endless security lines and being shunted from barrier to barrier and "pillar to post."  It had become evident that the federal and DC governments were more interested in providing "safe spaces" for leftist demonstrators than in enabling patriotic citizens to actually attend President Trump's inaugural events.

     All of this was obviously lost on the clueless national media "reporters" who purported to cover the inaugural events.  Not a single TV reporter was anywhere in sight on the south side of the Mall where these interminable lines formed and crawled.  So the national media outlets were simply ignorant of the reality that so many thousands attempting to attend the events were prevented from gaining timely access by the massive government security block-out.

     Consequently, once again the MSM's reporting was wrong and biased against President Trump and his supporters.  Insofar as it failed to recognize how excessive government barriers prevented so many thousands (like SR) from actually reaching the inaugural events in time, the MSM's portrayal of Saturday's crowds was seriously misleading.

    

    

TOXIC DEMOCRATS -- THE PARTY OF BUTYRIC ACID AND SPITEFUL SUBVERSION

     As the date for Donald Trump's inauguration approaches, the spiteful and subversive activities of the Democratic Left have reached a tipping point of destructive extremism. 

     Further, what were once dismissed as the extreme positions of the Democratic Party's radical fringe have now become its core tenets.  Consequently, it is no longer valid for a person to maintain his or her affiliation with the Democrats while purporting to disavow such core party policies as open borders, anti-white bias, anti-police hostility, gender-neutral bathrooms, and bellicose subversion of the incoming elected President and his administration.

     In short, if you are still a Democrat in January, 2017, you own the policies and behaviors outlined below. 

     The toxic character and attitude of today's Democratic Left (i.e., the Democratic Party core) is exemplified by two of many episodes reflecting the Democrats' malicious resentment of Mr.Trump and his supporters as they prepare for the inauguration festivities.

                                                  

        Jackie Evancho:  Innocent Teenage Target of Democrat Vitriol

     Since the vast majority of celebrity entertainers are vocally affiliated with the Democratic Left, very few prominent singers or other performers have agreed to perform at Mr. Trump's inaugural celebration.  The fact that so many leftist entertainers have spitefully flaunted this celebrity boycott of what has traditionally been a nonpartisan national celebration in itself demonstrates their vindictive attitude.

     But the embittered Democrats are not content with their leftist celebrities' turning their back on the inauguration.  No, they must amplify their spite by directing their mean-spirited malice against a guileless teenage girl who agreed to sing the National Anthem at Mr. Trump's inauguration.

     Jackie Evancho is a remarkably talented classical singer with amazing vocal range.  She has achieved great recording success on the classical and pop charts at only 16 years of age.  Having previously performed at Mr. Obama's inauguration, she was delighted to accept the invitation to do the same at Mr. Trump's.  Instantly, the legion of mean-spirited "progressives" who lurk on the social media like demented vultures pounced on the innocent songstress.  Since Ms. Evancho has no apparent political connections or motives, they resorted to making scurrilous -- and false -- attacks on her standing and prestige as a performer, implying or openly sneering that the inauguration organizers had been forced to resort to a C-list singer. 

     The belittling comments were false, but it is not hard to imagine the young lady's bewilderment at the unprovoked malice directed against her by so many angry adults.  But that is what leftist Democrats do:  Threaten and insult teenage girls who only want to sing for their country.

     It gets worse.  A group of leftist anti-Trump terrorists has been caught on videotape plotting to use noxious butyric acid to ruin an inaugural ball to be held by Trump supporters in the National Press Club.  The vicious plot was taped by the admirable Project Veritas group at a meeting held by the leftists at a notorious Democrat-related DC pizzeria.  The criminal plot has since been reported to the FBI and the DC police, but it is unclear what enforcement action will be taken.  But, again, this is precisely the kind of vicious subversion that is engendered by the Democrats' radical rejection of the legitimacy of Mr. Trump's election and presidency.

                                                  

             Rep. John Lewis:  the angry, embittered face of the Left-Wing Democrats

     While the mainstream media have been falsely and reflexively labeling the insurgent French and German conservative-nationalist parties (Germany's AfD and France's Front National) as the "extreme right," they refuse to acknowledge the reality that the U.S. Democratic Party is now a party of the extreme left.  This can be demonstrated beyond dispute by listing some notable examples of the extremist policy positions that are now at the core of the Democrat agenda -- to the extent that no serious contender for a major party nomination or leadership position could disavow or deny them.  These are now positions that you own if you remain a true Democrat:

     *  The radical anti-white/black-biased doctrines of the fraudulent Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement and similar black entitlement groups.  When a major Democrat presidential candidate timidly sought to soften the BLM slogan by saying "All lives matter," he was shouted down and forced to recant. The Democrats also embrace the offensive and bogus canard of so-called "White Privilege" -- in a country where comprehensive government preferences for blacks have been law, policy, and practice for roughly 50 years.

     *  Endorsement, facilitation, and support of illegal immigration, in a country already swamped by a tidal wave of both legal and illegal immigration.  This is typified by the lawless "Sanctuary City" policies of such Democrat-dominated cities as San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, and many others. The Democratic Party is fervently dedicated to the eradication and subordination of the historical European-based American majority by legions of immigrants who will vote Democratic precisely because of these policies.

     *  Aggressive enforcement of the most extreme policies and doctrines of the so-called LGBT movement. The Democratic Party not only approves and glorifies same-sex marriage (SSM); it ferociously condemns anyone who disapproves or refuses to participate in its normalization.  Beyond SSM, the Democrats fanatically support the bizarre agenda of the transgender movement, including the obliteration of sexual segregation in bathrooms, showers, and dressing rooms.  The Democrats want legal enforcement of the absurd notion that a person's sex or gender is whatever he or she declares it to be.

     *  The Democrats and their leaders embrace the anti-police rallying cry of the BLM movement -- namely, that the police are at fault whenever they use necessary violence to resist or suppress the criminal aggressions of black and other minority juveniles.  In case after case, Obama and other leading Democrats have endorsed the false narrative of the BLM and other radicals in taking the side of violent perps (like Michael Brown in the Ferguson incident) who attack police and then become heroes of the Left after they are justifiably shot in self-defense.

     *  Perhaps worst of all, Democrats are aggressively seeking to undermine the very legitimacy of Mr. Trump's election and his presidency before it even begins.  Democrat fanatics like Rep. John Lewis have expressly attacked Mr. Trump's presidency as illegitimate, and nearly 60 House Democrats (about one-third of the entire caucus) have joined him in boycotting the inauguration on those grounds.  Meanwhile, fellow Democrat radical Congresswoman Maxine Waters has ludicrously called for the impeachment of Mr. Trump before he assumes office.  This is precisely the kind of wild-eyed, deranged political fanaticism that has engendered the kind of butyric acid-throwing terrorism that presently threatens the presidential inaugural -- which until this year has been an occasion of national unity and at least temporary reconciliation.  In all this, the Democrats are playing a very dangerous game, potentially pushing the harsh divide that already prevails in America to the brink of civil disturbance -- or worse.

     It is hard fact today that the Democrats have failed miserably to win broad support at the ballot box.  Their loss in the presidential election was merely the apex of a movement which has resulted in their minority status in the U.S. Senate, the U.S. House, the governorships, and the state legislatures.  Their deranged resistance to the inauguration of a President whose electoral victory was an emphatic 304-227 reflects the raging, frustrated fury of an embittered party that, by moving relentlessly and recklessly to the left, has richly earned the title of "America's Extreme Left Democratic Party."

  

    

MCCAIN AND GRAHAM: RECKLESS RUSSOPHOBIA IN THE SENATE

     While Islamic terrorism rages violently at home and abroad, the two most prominent pseudo-Republicans in the U.S. Senate are busy directing their sputtering wrath against a fellow target of such terrorism:  the Russian Republic.

     Senators John McCain (Arizona) and Lindsey Graham (S.C.) have joined embittered Democrat allies in cultivating the canard that purported Russian "hacking" of various Democratic-operated computer systems somehow tilted the presidential election in favor of Donald Trump -- and thus undermined U.S. democracy. 

     It is hard to say whether McCain and Graham are having more fun recklessly attacking Russia or rashly seeking to undermine the legitimacy of Mr. Trump's 304-227 electoral vote presidency before it begins.  Both of them are horribly failed presidential candidates: McCain having surrendered almost without a struggle in the general election against Obama in 2008, and Graham having experienced defeat of ignominious proportions in his disastrous campaign in the 2016 GOP primaries.  It would be unfair, however, to suggest that their apparent determination to undermine Mr. Trump's incipient presidency by playing the Russia Card is motivated in any way by political jealousy and resentment.  Unfair, but not necessarily wrong.

     Whatever the motivation, these embittered cranks have indulged in Russophobic rants the likes of which have not been seen since the Red Hysteria at the height of the Cold War.

Unlike Russia's world champion lady figure skater, angry senators do not make a pretty picture to post on Splashing Rocks.  Courtesy YouTube.                   

     At recent senate hearings, for example, McCain inveighed that "every American should be alarmed" by Russia's purported meddling in the presidential election and that Russia's activities constituted "an unprecedented attack on our democracy."

     But SR is not at all "alarmed" by the fact that Russia engages in cyber-aided intelligence activities in the U.S., just as the U.S. and its allies do the same, and more, in other countries. 

     Here, for instance, is a quote from the same Washington Post that purports to be so "alarmed" by Russia's reputed cyber-spying on the feebly protected Democratic-operated computer systems during the past election period:  "U.S. intelligence services carried out 231 offensive cyber-operations in 2011, the leading edge of a clandestine campaign that embraces the Internet as a theater of spying, sabotage and war, according to top-secret documents obtained by The Washington Post."  (WP, Aug. 30, 2013). The story went on to state that Russia was among the "top priority targets" of these "offensive cyberoptions [that] can be an important element in deterring certain adversaries.”

     If the U.S. has been aggressively engaging in such widespread offensive Cyber-operations against Russia and other countries, it is hardly "alarming" or "unprecedented" that Russia engages in similar operations here.  Indeed, as documented elsewhere, Democrats in the past have sought the then Soviet Union's help in their futile campaigns against Ronald Reagan.

     Yet the enraged Sen. McCain has gone so far as to charge that Russia's purported cyber activities constituted "an act of war," with the logical implication that a proportional bellicose response would be demanded.  What particular responsive "act of war" McCain recommends is not clear. 

     In any case, it ill behooves John McCain to rage against Russia's purported distortion of a U.S. presidential election outcome when McCain's own preemptive unilateral disengagement effectively conceded the 2008 presidential election to the divisive anti-constitutional candidacy of Barack Hussein Obama. 

     As a prime example, McCain perversely refused to raise, let alone press, the critically relevant issue of Obama's contemptible affiliation with Jeremiah Wright, the rabidly afro-racist preacher who was Obama's spiritual guru.  In effect, McCain deprived millions of ingenuous American voters of information that would have been crucial to an informed, moral, and intelligent vote.  McCain again diverted voters from the truth when he sought to suppress a campaign audience's entirely justifiable concerns about Obama's fitness for the presidency with this incredibly feckless campaign statement:  “But I have to tell you, I have to tell you, he is a decent person, and a person that you do not have to be scared as President of the United States.”  That was false; as events have proven, voters had every reason to fear the divisive, anti-constitutional Obama presidency.  In short, McCain was withholding truthful information about the dangerous, radical leftist candidate he was supposedly opposing.

     In contrast, the supposedly subversive actions attributed to Russia (and WikiLeaks) during the 2016 campaign, if true, actually enhanced the voters' knowledge of the Democratic candidate and her party.

     Although McCain's Russophobic fulminations are disturbing enough, his sidekick, Sen. Graham, has gone to even greater extremes in his anti-Russian rants -- to the point of impugning the political integrity and patriotism of any Republican who disagrees with him on the issue, while leveling ever more bellicose charges against Russia.

     In a recent appearance on NBC's "Meet the Press," for example, Graham engaged in the following diatribe aimed at supporters of the President-elect: “To my Republican friends who are gleeful, you’re making a huge mistake. . . . Most Republicans are condemning what Russia did and to those who are gleeful it [sic]you’re a political hack. You’re not a Republican and you’re not a patriot.” He then continued his insulting rant by aligning himself squarely with the Democrat position on this issue ("When one party is compromised all of us are compromised," which is literally false) and calling for "bipartisan" anti-Russian sanctions -- all of which falls squarely in line with the Democrat objective of elevating the importance of the Russian activities with a view to delegitimizing Trump's victory, and his presidency.

     But Graham lurched even further into geopolitical lunacy with his incendiary remarks at a hearing held to showcase the angry duo's determination to engage in brinksmanship which neither of them will have to back up with action.  Flaunting his willingness to go far beyond Obama's diplomatic expulsion measures against Russia for the alleged hacking, Graham stated (emphasis added):

          "So, ladies and gentlemen, it is time now not to throw pebbles, but to throw rocks. I wish we were not here. If it were up to me, we would all live in peace, but Putin is up to no good, and he needs to be stopped."
    
     Graham did not specify what he meant by "throwing rocks," but his plain implication was that we could no longer "live in peace" with Russia because Putin "needs to be stopped."

     These are extreme and needlessly bellicose statements, out of all proportion to the purported Russian activities to which they are directed.  Fortunately, both President-elect Trump and President Putin are more rational and level-headed than Sen. Graham, and neither is likely accept his invitation to a new round of escalation and brinksmanship reminiscent of the Cold War.
    
     Nonetheless, it is worth considering the reckless and utterly imprudent nature of Graham's impetuous rant.

     Someone should remind Graham that a genuine conflict with Russia would not be conducted by "throwing rocks."  Although Russia's conventional forces are inferior to ours, Russia's nuclear capacity is reportedly at almost exact parity with the U.S. in terms of nuclear weapons deployed on Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles:  each country is believed to have about 1,640, although the details are obviously classified.  In other words, Russia remains an extremely dangerous global nuclear power, not to mention a formidable conventional arms power as well in the European theater.

     Given these realities, why would any responsible U.S. leader wish to cultivate hostile and confrontational relations with Russia except under the most severe provocation?  Although the purported Russian "hacking" of computer information carelessly maintained by various Democratic entities and persons would be objectionable, and would warrant appropriately measured response, it is far from the menacing "act of war" so glibly invoked by McCain and Graham.  As asserted in the above-quoted Washington Post report, U.S. intelligence services have likewise pursued "a clandestine campaign that embraces the Internet as a theater of spying, sabotage and war."  Under these circumstances, it seems hardly prudent for the U.S. to suddenly treat the inherently devious and subversive acts of espionage, cyber intelligence, and propaganda engaged in by the U.S. and other nations as incendiary acts of war.

     Instead, it would probably be best if everyone took a deep breath and recognized the distinction between the Marxist-Leninist, atheistic, and world revolutionary Union of Soviet Socialist Republics; versus the emphatically Christian, heavily privatized, profit-loving and capitalistic, and Slavic-oriented Russian Republic.  Russia and President Putin have more interest in propping up their economy, suppressing Chechnyan and other Islamic terrorism, and securing their interests along their western border than in any kind of direct confrontation with the United States.  Not to mention maintaining the most graceful and talented array of lady figure skaters in the civilized world.

     In short, there are apt to be more areas of contained competition -- and even mutual interest -- between the U.S. and Russia than areas of irreducible conflict.

     President-elect Trump is prudent and reasonable in stating that it is foolish to denigrate and undermine good relations with Russia, as Senators McCain and Graham seem determined to do.  The U.S. faces more than enough imminent threats on its own borders and in the realm of global Islamic terrorism for it to seek confrontation and brinkmanship with Russia.

    

MSM "BLACKWASHING" FAILS TO PREVENT HATE CRIME PROSECUTION IN CHICAGO

            Splashing Rocks has repeatedly exposed the mainstream media's persistent and perverse suppression of news and information revealing the widespread instances of black-on-white crime.  See here and here and here.  http://splashingrocks.blogspot.com/2013/07/obama-media-and-humpty-dumpty-method-of.html.  But this week in Chicago, four vicious black miscreants descended to a level of depravity that stands out even in the infuriating annals of afro-racist crime that has plagued the nation throughout the Obama years.

    We will not rehash the disgusting details of the self-recorded Chicago atrocity.  Suffice to say, it entailed prolonged subjugation of a mentally disabled young man (18 years old) to the most painful and humiliating abuse, accompanied by anti-white and anti-Trump insults and taunting.

            Had it been left to the likes of NBC, CNN, MSNBC, ABC and their ilk, this grotesque episode of afro-racist hate crime would have been relegated to the dead-letter file which is the destination of hundreds of similar stories.  But we fortunately live in a time when those fraudulent media outlets – now known scornfully as the MSM – are no longer able to suppress news and information they deem politically disadvantageous to their leftist/Democratic cause.

     Hundreds of conservative on-line websites, blogs, and aggregators instantly picked up the deeply disturbing video of the crime that the Chicago perps, incredibly, were stupid enough to publish live on Facebook.  Indeed, the mind-boggling stupidity of these fools in publishing this video falls so far beyond the bounds of even minimal rationality as to defy belief.  One explanation might be that these deranged juveniles act on the basis of atavistic instinct rather than rational assessment.  In any case, it is very difficult to maintain a lawful and civilized society when such crass barbarism is as widespread as it is in Chicago and similar feral cities.

            But even after the full horror of this egregious hate crime had been exposed, MSM outlets like MSNBC and CNN were brazenly attempting to downplay and extenuate the episode.  For some reason – we can guess the answer – MSNBC and CNN rely almost entirely upon black commentators and panelists to respond predictably to race-tinged news stories like this one. 

                                                             

            Drunk or Sober, Don Lemon is a disgrace to journalism -- and to decency

     CNN's "blackwashing" of the incident was particularly egregious and offensive.  In a black-dominated panel moderated by black anchorman Don Lemon, a black apologist named Symone Sanders (described as a "Democratic strategist") absurdly challenged the obvious conclusion that this self-documented orgy of anti-white torment was a hate crime.  With mind-numbing hypocrisy and audacity, Sanders scolded, " we cannot callously go about classifying things as a hate crime.”  The only "callousness" involved, of course, is Sanders so glibly contending that this patently obvious hate crime could be considered as anything less.

     But Sanders' outrageous extenuation of the Chicago outrage was soon exceeded by Don Lemon himself.  Adopting the standard leftist line that malicious crime should be considered as merely misguided youthful misbehavior when perpetrated by black juveniles, Lemon flatly stated, "I don't think it was evil."  To leave no doubt as to his moral incoherence, Lemon then repeated the same statement for emphasis, adding that it was merely a case of "young people" with "bad home training."  And on this occasion – unlike his boorish intoxication televised nationally on New Year's Eve – Lemon does not even have the excuse of being drunk out of his mind on shots of tequila.

            Lemon is so blinded by his afro-racist prejudices that he not only got his reasoning wrong, but his facts as well.  One of the depraved "Chicago Four" is a 24-year-old mother of two, and the other three are 18 – old enough to vote, make legal decisions, and serve in the armed forces.  And old enough to sink to depths of depravity that would never even occur to a genuinely youthful person. 

            There should be no doubt here:  Don Lemon's depraved and repeated insistence that this vile hate crime was not "evil" confirms beyond any dispute that he is unfit to serve as a television journalist, let alone as the anchor of a nationally broadcast news show.  Any network with a modicum of dignity and responsibility would fire him forthwith. -- even apart from his nationally broadcast tequila bender. But Lemon's blackness itself shields him from the accountability that should mandate his ignominious dismissal.

      Thankfully, the relentless reporting of the conservative on-line media made it impossible for the confused and disjointed Chicago Law enforcement authorities to minimize the revolting racist crimes that appalled all decent Americans.  Initially, clueless Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson sought to minimize the severity of the outrage with a series of inane extenuations.  “If you look at that video… it’s just stupidity,” Johnson bleated.  Not content with stupidity on a global scale, he then entered the rare realm of cosmic imbecility, when he croaked, “Kids make stupid decisions — I shouldn’t call them kids, they’re legally adults. But they’re young adults and they make stupid decisions."  Just like Chicago police superintendents make stupid statements.

     With a delusional blockhead like Johnson in charge of its police, it is small wonder that Chicago has a record-setting murder rate that dwarfs that of even urban war zones like Baltimore, Atlanta, New York, and Philadelphia.

     Fortunately, somewhere in the dark recesses of Chicago government there are some prosecutors and other officials with a modicum of sanity and sense of responsibility to the city's embattled populace.  As this blog is posted, each of the Chicago Four has been charged with hate crimes, felony aggravated kidnapping, aggravated unlawful restraint and aggravated battery with a deadly weapon.  Three of these lawless thugs also face charges of burglary, while one has been charged with possession of a stolen car.  And a sensible Chicago judge has ordered them all held without bail.

      It is excellent that the Chicago enforcement authorities appear to be prosecuting these barbarians with the full force of the criminal statutes.  But a crucial fact should not be forgotten:  Had it been up to the mainstream media, this disgraceful episode would likely have been relegated to a forgotten footnote, and the Chicago Four would have avoided the forceful prosecution that they now face.  Thanks to the glare of publicity engendered by conservative on-line truth-tellers, however, the Chicago authorities could not avoid the overwhelming evidence of an appalling racial hate crime that could not be blackwashed.

     Addendum.  Just when you thought that the MSM could not sink any lower in its malicious, anti-white misrepresentation of inter-racial crime in America, this happens:  A vile CBS radio outlet distorted its description of the above afro-racist hate crime in such a way as to indicate that it was an attack on a black victim perpetrated by white Trump supporters -- the complete opposite of what occurred.  The insidious leftist media continue to follow the legacy of  Joseph Goebbels, namely, that the Big Lie is the most effective way to distort reality in favor of the liar's viewpoint.

MCCAFFREY, MERKEL, AND MISCELLANEOUS YEAR-END MADNESS

     At year's end, Splashing Rocks finds itself appalled by so many episodes of moral and mental vacuity at home and abroad that settling upon a single dismal subject for vilification simply won't do.  So, departing from our usual penetrating in-depth essay format, we resort to a more cursory exposition of a variety of disturbing developments that plague us as we look forward to better times under a new administration -- and, perhaps, a new era of sense and sanity.

     Merkel Madness in Germany.  Earlier this year, SR called attention to the three brave female leaders -- the Le Pen's of France and Frauke Petry of Germany -- who offered the prospect of some desperately needed backbone in standing up to the de facto Islamic invasion of Europe.  The urgent need for the steely measures proposed by these intrepid ladies and their nationalist parties was  underscored this week by the preventable terrorist murder of at least twelve Germans by a Muslim asylum-seeker in Berlin.  The Tunisian "refugee" who drove a hijacked truck into an open-air Christmas market had already been identified as a serious terrorist threat by the so-called authorities of Angela Merkel's government.  Yet they  inexplicably let him roam Germany at will until he executed the slaughter that his arrest would have prevented. 

     The Berlin killer, one Anis Amri, easily evaded Merkel's feckless minions inside Germany.  Then, courtesy of the EU's crass open border policy, Amri effortlessly crossed into France and Italy before a plucky rookie Italian policeman fatally shot him in Milan.  Meanwhile, the poltroons of Merkel's bootless security agencies are doubtless misdirecting their confused attentions upon the righteous wrath of German citizens against the Islamic invasion within, instead of upon "refugee" terrorists like Amri. 
                                                 

  Frauke Petry and the AfD: "Coming ashore" to Germany's rescue?

     Waiting in the wings, however, Frauke Petry's Alternative fur Deutschland (AfD) party rightly condemns the Merkel government for inviting Islamic terrorism into Germany under the cover of the million Muslim refugees whom Merkel ordered Germans to embrace.  A more deadly embrace would be hard to imagine.  If lethargic Germans continue to reject the AfD's urgent warnings and again ratify Merkel's failed policies of abject appeasement -- Germany's federal elections are to be held next fall -- they can only expect a future of ever more deadly Islamicist incursion. Like Obi Wan Kenobi in Star Wars, Ms. Petry and the AfD, in alliance with like-minded patriotic elements, may be Germany's only hope against the forces of the dark side.

     Russia, WikiLeaks and an Alternative FOIA.  Democrats and the deranged left -- but I repeat myself -- have outdone McCarthy era Republican Red-baiters in their odd obsession with the "Russian Menace" in the wake of their election humiliation at the hands of Donald Trump.  They are blaming their defeat upon purported Russian hacking of Democrat- and government-related computer targets -- like the Democratic National Committee, Hillary Clinton's notorious "secret server," and Clinton operative John Podesta -- and the damaging release of hacked e-mails by Julian Assange's shadowy WikiLeaks organization.  Assange flatly denies that Russia was Wiki's source, but the political and media left persist in their foam-flecked rant that "the Russians" insidiously and successfully subverted the U.S. elections in favor of Mr. Trump. Much can be said to refute this contrived nonsense, but space limits us to these main points:

        1.  Even if Russia acted as alleged, its supposedly aberrational intrusion into U.S. affairs was little more than business-as-usual in the cut-throat realm of international intelligence and cyber- and propaganda warfare. In the shadowy world of global espionage as practiced by the likes of the CIA and the KGB, it was about as "shocking" as the gambling in Rick's Bar in Casablanca. 

                                            

    Democrats and their media are "shocked" that spies are spying

        2.  Indeed, it ill behooves the Obama administration to over-react to alleged Russian interference in U.S. politics when Obama's agents have engaged in similar intrusions into Russia's internal affairs -- and this is only what we know of.  Some readers will recall the obnoxious Russian performance artists called Pussy Riot, who engaged in a grossly sacrilegious performance in a Russian Orthodox Cathedral to mock President Putin.  After the group was justly convicted and sentenced (a lenient 2 years imprisonment) for their outrageous desecration, the Obama White House sought to exploit the episode and embarrass Putin politically by falsely accusing the Russians of human rights violations and "disproportionate" sentencing.  Further, Obama's leftist UN Ambassador, the insufferable Samantha Power, subsequently conspired with Pussy Riot members to amplify U.S. support of the group's campaign to undermine Putin.  In other words, any Russian hacking of U.S. political groups could just as likely have been retaliation for U.S. interference in Russian domestic affairs rather than some kind of absurdly Quixotic attempt to manipulate a U.S. election.

        3.  Far from subverting the U.S. election, if Russia and WikiLeaks caused the disclosures attributed to them they would deserve a degree of credit for facilitating the free flow of information that Clinton and the Democrats sought to suppress.  It should not be forgotten that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's secret computer server was designed to insulate her e-mails and other communications from State Department records that would have been subject to public disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).  If Russia in fact facilitated public disclosure of material information that Clinton and her political minions were seeking to suppress, they were supporting the free flow of information that Clinton and her allies were seeking to block.  In short, Russia and WikiLeaks were providing an unofficial shadow FOIA while Clinton and the Democrats were subverting the actual FOIA.

     The Depressing Venality of Christian McCaffrey's Sun Bowl Cop-Out.  Though sports may seem trivial measured against global issues of war and peace, the impacts of Big Time Sports in America cannot be so lightly dismissed.  SR has previously noted that the artificial significance of professional and major college sports has supplanted religion as the "opiate of the people," providing a dysfunctional distraction from the genuinely important issues of personal and public life.  A recent episode involving an admirable college football star aptly illustrates the profoundly corrupting effect of our grossly inflated and mercenary sports culture upon American society and values.

     Stanford running back Christian McCaffrey was the subject of an earlier piece on this blog noting his unusual achievements in a position almost exclusively dominated by swift black athletes (McCaffrey is white, fast, and the scion of an especially gifted athletic family).  His performance in 2015 was so outstanding that he was runner-up for the Heisman Trophy and honored as the AP's college football player of the year.  Although his and Stanford's performance dropped off a bit in 2016 (he was briefly sidelined with injury earlier in the year), McCaffrey has nonetheless again drawn extensive national attention, but for different and disturbing reasons.  He announced that he would not play with his teammates in their Sun Bowl matchup with the North Carolina Tar Heels.on December 30.

     McCaffrey's abrupt abandonment of his team before their bowl game was not due to injury (he is fully recovered from his earlier mishap), a death or illness in the family, or some other extenuating personal crisis.  Instead, his sole justification was that he wanted to "begin my draft prep immediately."  He was referring to the draft of the corrupt and politicized National Football League (not the U.S. Army) which takes place on April 27-29 of 2017 -- four months after the Sun Bowl game.
                              

UNC Quarterback Mitch Trubisky won't leave teammates in lurch for NFL "draft prep"  
   
     But McCaffrey has been in sufficiently good playing shape to excel at the highest levels of NCAA football for the past several months.  So there is no apparent reason why he could not delay whatever "prep" he needs until after one final game with the teammates whose support enabled him to become a star in the first place. 

     The grotesque player cattle show known as the NFL Combine does not take place until early March, so McCaffrey would also have ample time to "prep" for that after the Sun Bowl.  Any advantage he would gain in that regard by skipping the bowl game would be minimal at best.  McCaffrey's claim that he needs to skip the Sun Bowl to prepare for the draft is patently bogus.

     Another justification widely seized upon by McCaffrey's defenders is that even the slight risk of a career-threatening injury is not worth participation in what they describe as a "meaningless bowl game." Reduced to its essence, this reasoning would militate against participation in almost all college football games by serious pro prospects like McCaffrey.  Playing in his last regular season game against California posed just as much injury risk as playing in the Sun Bowl, and no conference or national championships were at stake in that game.  In effect, McCaffrey's defenders would relegate all the historic bowl games that were not part of a national championship playoff to the category of "meaningless exhibition games" that are simply not worth playing in the case of serious NFL prospects like McCaffrey.

    But North Carolina's star quarterback, Mitch Trubisky, apparently failed to read the memo absolving top NFL prospects of any obligation to join their college teammates in playing a final bowl game.  Trubisky's NFL prospects are even greater than McCaffrey's, as he is rated the No. 1 quarterback prospect in the next NFL draft.  Yet Trubisky apparently does not regard the slight risk of injury, or the need for a few more weeks "prep" for the draft, as justification for dropping out of the Sun Bowl.

     This underscores a factor that the NFL-obsessed sports media types either disregard or consider unimportant in their monolithic defense of McCaffrey's cop-out:  There is no strong reason why all college players with NFL prospects should not, by their reasoning, pursue the same course and opt out of any game they consider "meaningless."  Thankfully, there are still players like Mitch Trubisky who have not completely abandoned their team spirit and youthful zest for pure competition to the venal mercenary demands of the NFL juggernaut.

     There was a time when principles of duty, loyalty, esprit de corps, and simple team and college spirit would have rendered the desertion of one's team on the eve of a bowl game unthinkable.  Not so today.  Indeed, the overwhelming consensus of response to McCaffrey's cop-out, especially in the soulless sports media, has been that his decision was a so-called "no brainer" because the avoidance of any risk to his mercenary pro football prospects obviously outweighs the value of joining his teammates in a mere college bowl game.

     The irony in this reasoning is rich indeed.  On the one hand, college football programs like Stanford's are considered so important that their coaches are paid multi-million dollar salaries dwarfing those of university presidents and the most prestigious faculty; colossal stadiums of Caligulan extravagance are erected to stage a mere six or seven games a year; and many universities flaunt their fabled football programs as the chief enticement to attract prospective students.  Yet the same feckless sports commentators who devote hours of fawning coverage to the college games now dismiss them as "meaningless" when weighed against a few privileged players' speculative fears that playing in one final game with their mates could somehow jeopardize their mercenary NFL prospects.  To these venal characters, time-tested virtues of loyalty, honor, and personal sacrifice for a team or a school are laughably obsolete when balanced against the inflated wealth and celebrity of an NFL career.
    
     The NFL has become a grossly inflated economic and social monster that has now been further corrupted by afro-racist politics, as evidenced by the Colin Kaepernick anti-anthem protest and the grotesque spectacle of players scornfully flaunting black power salutes as they race onto the field.  Despite this blatant mockery, millions of feckless white fans persist in spending thousands of dollars on tickets for the "privilege" of cheering the very afro-racist athletes who are thumbing their nose at them. 

     That a seemingly well-grounded and well-educated Stanford stalwart like Christian McCaffrey is willing to abandon his teammates, his university, and the most basic principles of loyalty to embrace the deeply corrupted NFL is a sad commentary on the inverted and venal values of our age.

    

COERCED POLITICAL CONFORMITY IN SPORTS: WHO WILL STAND DOWN THE LGBT TOTALITARIANS?

     The Maine University basketball team recently ventured into Duke University's intimidating Cameron Indoor Stadium to play Duke's powerful Blue Devils.  Predictably, Maine was demolished, 94-55, even though Duke played without several of its best players.

     Although losing badly to Duke on its home court is no disgrace, Maine's performance was nonetheless disgraceful and disturbing for reasons having nothing to do with the rout it suffered on the court.

     The entire Maine squad wore "rainbow-themed" warm-up jerseys in ostentatious and provocative solidarity with the most extreme elements of the LGBT/transgender movement.  It appears that the obnoxious politicization currently infecting the NFL and the NBA is spreading inexorably to other athletic forums.

     The purpose of Maine's gay jersey display was to protest a law (designated as HB 2) passed by the North Carolina legislature in order to, inter alia, protect innocent girls from sharing their bathrooms and showers with nasty, leering men claiming to "identify" as women. 

     Maine's players failed miserably in putting up a respectable showing against Duke on the court, but they sure showed the world they could stand tall on the side of brawny transexuals in their quest to violate the modesty and privacy of girls who -- quelle horreur! -- want to be left alone with other girls in their restrooms and showers.

                                             

      Transgender activist lays down the party line for submissive Maine players

     HB 2 applies to government and public university facilities in the State of North Carolina, and has no application to either Duke (a private university) or to Maine, its university, or any of its players.  In short, HB 2 is none of Maine's or Duke's business, let alone the business of their highly privileged 19-21 year-old scholarship athletes.  Who, by the way, enjoy the most comfortable, privileged, and private locker rooms and showers.

     HB 2 was enacted to prevent local governments in North Carolina from passing radical legislation that gives privileged treatment to homosexuals and transgendered persons beyond what is provided by the state's ample antidiscrimination laws.  In particular, it prevents local governments from adopting laws that would entitle burly biological males, for example, from using girls restrooms as long as they purport to "identify" as females. 

     Under the lunatic LGBT doctrine that the Democratic left seeks to impose on society, any brawny male who "identifies" as female can demand to be treated as such and to use female restroom and shower facilities.  You know, the places where it was once safe for nubile young females to undress free from the leering eyes of any biological male who claims to be a female in spirit.  But under the prevailing coercion of the LGBT juggernaut, a modest female's claim to privacy must yield to the obnoxious demands of the transgender intruders.  That is precisely the kind of grotesque legal and social absurdity that HB 2 is intended to combat.

     But a twisted collectivist mentality has so deeply infected American society that something as basic and straightforward as maintaining separate restrooms and showers for females and males is now considered contemptible.  Overnight, the social justice fanatics of the LGBT movement have managed to upend millennia of civilized social norms with barely a whimper of resistance from the society at large.  The U.S. has indeed become a Nation of Sheep.

     Ironically, nowhere has the surrender to the demands of the LGBT totalitarians been more abject than in the fields of collegiate and professional athletics -- a cohort where one would expect to find rugged and manly characters who are not readily intimidated by the LGBT radicals.  But, sadly, that expectation would be wrong.  Where is Chuck Bednarik when we need him?

     After mediocre defensive end Michael Sam became the first openly homosexual player drafted by the NFL, the media swooned in raptures of slobbering celebration.  Many news outlets eagerly  flaunted shock-value photos of Sam kissing his reputed boyfriend in celebration (all celebration turned out to be premature, however, since Sam failed to make the cut as an actual NFL player). 

     When a red-blooded Miami Dolphins defensive back named Don Jones expressed revulsion at these provocative pictures  -- he responded by merely tweeting "OMG" and "Horrible" -- the Dolphins' management promptly pounced on him like Soviet commissars punishing a deviant cadre in a Stalinist purge.  Jones was instantly fined; banned from team activities until he had completed "sensitivity training;" and forced to publicly apologize. 

     The similarity to the methods used to enforce political correctness in the former Soviet Union and in Maoist China could hardly be plainer.  Jones was forced to engage in the same kind of "self-criticism" that has long been a staple of ideological brainwashing in totalitarian societies. 

     Jones is black.  Had be been punished in this way for insulting, say, a police officer instead of the LGBT monolith, the media would have indignantly arisen in his defense and reflexively raised the specter of racism.  Instead, they reflexively raised the phony specter of homophobia and pounced in unison on the hapless Mr. Jones.

     And Jones is hardly the only pro athlete who has been forced to kowtow to the relentlessly pro-LGBT agenda of the NFL and the NBA.  Just ask NBA players Kobe Bryant, Roy Hibbert, Joakim Noah, and Rajon Rondo, each of whom was forced to apologize in Soviet-style self-criticism for uttering so-called "gay slurs." Bryant was even fined a cool $100,000 for his casual offense against the pro-gay juggernaut.  In short, when the NFL and the NBA are not cravenly approving their players' provocative afro-racist demonstrations on the field, they are harshly penalizing any players' deviation from their pro-LGBT collectivism.

     Which brings us back to the hapless members of the rainbow-clad Maine basketball squad.  Where, one wonders, did these young men come up with the improbable idea to drape themselves in LGBT/rainbow t-shirts to protest a distant state's efforts to preserve the sexual privacy of restrooms and showers?  Is that what strapping young athletes discuss when they sit around the locker room or the dining hall?  Did they choose this course of action themselves, or were they chosen?

     SR has examined Maine's team roster and found it consists of a more diverse international collection than the typical Division 1 basketball squad -- several Serbs, a Turk from Istanbul, blacks from Louisville, KY, Brooklyn, and Bethlehem, Pa., and a predictable number from Maine itself.  One thing is certain, however:  In such a diverse collection of presumably normal young male athletes, there were undoubtedly some who would not be troubled at all by the notion that restrooms and showers should be restricted to persons of the same biological sex.  Like the ones who have little sisters, or nice girlfriends.

     Although one Maine player was quoted in express support of the rainbow-shirt protest, it is by no means clear, and probably doubtful, that members of the team voluntarily and unanimously actively favored this presumptuous demonstration.

     On the contrary, it appears that the Maine demonstration was orchestrated and subtly coerced by a combination of the LGBT activist "You Can Play" organization, the American East Conference, and Maine's administration and/or head coach.  As shown by the above photo, someone in the university hierarchy evidently shepherded the team into a conference room for a televised brainwashing session on HB 2 and other LGBT/transgender issues by a formerly female transgender activist named Chris Mosier.  Given these overwhelming institutional pressures, and the atmosphere of conformity to the most radical LGBT doctrines prevailing at most U.S. colleges, it is sadly unsurprising that none of the Maine players openly objected to the anti-HB 2 demonstration.

     If multi-millionaire superstars like Kobe Bryant cannot stand up against the overbearing LGBT enterprise, I suppose we cannot expect anonymous hoopsters at a mid-level college program to do so.  In any case, that is how low our expectations of principled individuality have descended.

     The sad fact is that a perverse collective conformity on issues concerning homosexual privilege, so-called same-sex marriage, and, most recently, transgender entitlement has taken hold in American society at large.  The organized sports world is merely a prominent and visible manifestation of this demoralizing tendency.  The values and standards of successive legions of parents, grandparents, and ancestors, grounded in nature, religion, and social order, have been upended and eviscerated with startling rapidity. 

     In this way, the unquestioned inviolability of women-only restrooms, showers, and dressing rooms has been demolished overnight in society's craven rush to codify a norm -- the "right" to self-select one's sexual identity and force others to accept it -- that barely a decade ago would have been considered utterly laughable. 

     By merely attempting to preserve a protective social norm long ingrained in civilized societies, North Carolina finds itself boycotted and vilified by the NBA (All-Star Game moved), the NCAA (championship events relocated), and even State governments (New York's obnoxious Gov. Cuomo, e.g., has banned non-essential state travel to NC for this absurd reason). 

     Eager to join in this orgy of collectivist insanity, Duke's spineless and unspellable Coach K-shefski (misspelled on purpose, since spelling this jerk's annoying name correctly isn't worth the trouble) has declared from his profound knowledge of the law that HB 2 is "embarrassing." 

     What is really embarrassing is when an overpaid custodian of over-privileged and pampered athletes, like those athletes themselves, presumes to impose his ill-informed snap judgments on others.  It is just possible that North Carolina's elected legislators have a better grasp on the legitimate social standards of their states' people than privileged athletes, ill-informed coaches, or the radical social activists who lead them by the nose.

     Although contemporary New England may breed docile conformists like those of the Maine basketball program, it once produced rugged individualists like Henry Thoreau.  The sports community and the society at large are both in dire need of a jolt from some latter-day rebels like Thoreau who "march to the beat of a different drummer" and are ready to scorn the demands of the LGBT juggernaut and other totalitarians of the left.