2016 Nov 25^th

Cal Thomas holds forth this morning with a column headed “A Tale of ‘Hamilton,’ Trump and liberal diversity.” Thomas tells us that Trump wants the actor Brandon Victor Dixon to apologize for the tacky (Thomas’ term) lecturing of the Vice President on diversity and the “fear” of people like himself of a Trump-Pence administration. Pence, on the other hand apparently had no problem with the actor’s remarks and said so.

Then Thomas comments that as he watched the comings and goings from Trump Tower and the New Jersey golf resort he saw only one woman not connected to a man who was being considered, and that was Michelle Rhee the controversial Democratic former head of the Washington D.C. schools system. If Ms. Rhee was ever being seriously considered for Secretary of Education (And if she wasn’t why was Trump interviewing her?) that consideration ended abruptly when she took herself out of the running. The job subsequently went to Betsy DeVos a much richer, and very much whiter female candidate.

Thomas spends the rest of his column, about 80 percent of it flogging a woman, K. T. McFarland for Secretary of Defense. WOW, who is this woman and why should we hope that she is put in charge of our defense apparatus just behind the POTUS?

We are told that “She held positions in the Nixon, Ford and Reagan administrations (None of these positions are specified) and now she is a commentator on Fox News. McFarland told Thomas that she was an early and vocal Trump supporter and that she briefed Trump before the debates. She has a B.A. from Georgetown, an M.A from Oxford and she darn near got a Ph.D. from MIT, winding up with an ABD. (All but the dissertation) Hey what more could anyone want in the person heading up the armed forces?

She came close; Just today Trump Transition announced that K.T. McFarland would be the new Deputy National Security Advisor, Deputy to General Michael Flynn. That’s nowhere near being Secretary of Defense but maybe the country will be even safer with her in this slot.

Thomas Sowell also has a column today. He, as usual, has unpleasant thigs to say about liberals. He begins by pointing out that “One maddening aspect of their thinking, or non-thinking, is their failure to understand that there is nothing you can do about the past.” That is nonsense; of course, you can’t change the past but you can compensate for past abuses. That’s what the legal system is all about. Strike a pedestrian while you are driving drunk and try to tell the judge that the accident is in the past and nothing can be done about it. The notion is pathetic. Sowell’s cumbersome thought processes hope to make a different point, that is that by the time a student is ready for college the admissions committee should not look at the applicant’s childhood but only at his/her present condition. He claims, “There are people who urge college admissions committees to let disadvantaged students be admitted with lower test scores or other academic indicators.” If Sowell had ever sat on a college admissions committee he would quickly discover that the student’s history before he/she takes any entrance examinations is of critical importance.

The Spanish Consul’s daughter is applying for admission. She has had just three years of English in her high school but she is quite fluent in Italian and French. Too bad her SAT verbal scores are in the low 400s. If her background is not considered by the admissions committee the college will soon have a new director of admissions.

Thomas Sowell, once again, doesn’t know what he is talking about.