Jeff Jacoby wants to disband the TSA

and make security once again the bailiwick of the airlines. Ah yes....the airlines those stern incorruptible institutions that are looking to stack us up like cordwood in those meshugginah jets. I'm not gonna go too deeply into this, Jeff would privatize the oxygen supply if he could no I'll just note that airline security was securely in private hands on the morning of September 11th 2001. Not a single solitary Al Queda hijacker was prevented from boarding their targeted airliners by ruggedly individualistic profit motivated private sector security force. Given the alternate with a demonstrated record of 100% failure in a clinch...I think I'll stick with the TSA for now.

Is it me or is

Jeb Bush's current advert buy in NH plain awful? A bunch of toxically privileged toadies croaking Jeb's praises as the toughest thing on two feet since the Death of Bruce Lee.... And meanwhile Jeb "I Eat Nails for Breakfast" Bush is being beaten in the polls like a Red Headed Stepchild by a giddy sawbones whose dyslexia causes him to consistently misidentify a Pyramid for a Grain Silo. Da Facts are falling far short of the hype I think. Now the rumors are that Jeb's campaign are about to get rough with former protege Marco Rubio....which might be a gut check time for the mainstream GOP, if Jeb beats down Marco then around whom can the insiders coalesce if Trump starts gulp....winning primaries?? So I'm guessing Jeb might be getting some unwelcome push back on what amounts to a desperate plan to take Rubio down with him. Which in turn is a good test of just how narcissistic Jeb and all of La Famiglia Arbusto is when push cometh to shove.

The Globe has made a half hearted attempt to tempt

Congressperson Katherine Clark into the 2018 gubernatorial election, both she and Maura Healey have both wisely given a pass to the project. Katherine Clark represents one of the safest seats in the history of the US House of Representatives and while this makes her a good leadership prospect within the caucus it doesn't do much to project electoral power into swing precincts in Worcester & Plymouth Counties. Just sayin' thass all. Some of that article on the front page is a bid to excite the ambitions of the still thwarted PUMA wing of the state democratic partei....I urge all and sundry NOT to inhale any heady vapors exuded by the Boston Globe. Morrissey Blvd may be a liberal paper still, but when it comes to ginning up a good fight for 2018 idealogy takes a back seat to filling up a good card. Keep in mind the Globe's editorial pages luuuuv writing obits for liberals and liberalism a nice landslide for Baker fills up that need quite nicely. Besides Senator Markey is not a young man....and has remained silent so far as I can tell about his plans in 2020.... Which brings me to my main point, right now Charlie Spreadsheets is riding high in the polls, as democrats we are waiting on the issues and inscrutable fate to give us a good starting position in 2018, right now we don't have that Katherine Clark or no Katherine Clark. If I had to speculate we might need someone who can self finance the next time around, it might be a more favorable circumstance for the likes of Steve Pagliucca or the like.

Unemployment has hit 5%

the US Economy added 271,000 jobs last month. Wow. Can someone drive up to New Hampshire and tell Jeb Bush he can crawl home to Florida with his dignity intact because "Obama Already Fixed It". :)

UMass Amherst joins a lengthening list of

colleges and universities that are no longing making SAT score a core requirement for admission. I for one, could not be happier. Standardized testing was the bastardized offspring of the "Sputnik Scare" of 1957 wherein the likes of Henry Luce were in a bowel loosening panic that the US might be falling behind in the technology race with the USSR. We needed more scientists and engineers so education had to get away from mere "enlightenment" and start supporting the Nation's Cold War Priorities. Which meant standardization and more testing and tracking. Soon enough the score and metrics inspired the state legislatures (those bastions of employment for 3rd rate lawyers, befuddled ex cops and undertakers) to transform themselves into Boards of Pedagogy and viola! INSTANT MEDIOCRITY! I stand athwart all this and cry "STOP" an end to feckless testing that canalizes the student and limits the teaching options of the teacher....and lets get the Legislatures OUT of the business of literally defining the concept of education itself. I'd sooner entrust that debate to Synod of Orangutangs. So yes...Kudos to UMass this is important and a positive step.

Geez Guess I was wrong

looks like ISIS brought down that Russian Airbus in the Sinai after all. Although....there is still a chance it was not sabotage, US Intell is flagging a bomb pretty bluntly so the chances of an Act of God being the cause seems awfully slim. Nevertheless this is the last and only Wake Up Call Putin is gonna get in the region, after this, ISIS will start polishing up asides inside continental Russia. This is a big step up for ISIS in general they are moving outside the Middle East which is inevitable given their horizontal leaderless organization style. My Gut is, Putin doesn't have the resources or the diplomatic will to hang tough in Syria, I may be wrong about that as well my record so far on this is indifferent I suspect his best hope is to restore some of Russia's region credibility by brokering partition as he cannot guarantee outright victory. On the other hand it's likely too late to reconsider intervention, this week's homicidal incident means Russia is in the cross hairs Assad or no Assad. We are about to see just how well Vladimir Putin performs in a situation where he does not have the element of surprise on his side.....

If Vladimir Putin is smart

(and the jury is still out on The Little Father on that score) he'll take this plane crash in the Sinai as a good indicator of how badly ISIS wants to mess with Russia. Granted initial reports indicate that the plane crashed due to technical issues and was not brought down by ISIS, but boy howdy sure do want to do that and so much more don't they? We'll see how long Putin sticks it out in Syria when his beloved Spetnatz are getting beheaded on Youtube. But that is the folly of intervention in the region, the major powers think the calculus of power politics is somehow sovereign in the Middle East and it never is, theocide and ecstatic self destruction trump ye olde balance of power every time. This is after all a region where Arab howl about apartheid in Israel while they are slaughtering their own from Aleppo to Anbar Province....