From my morning inbox …
Dear Joshua,
With the nation still struggling to come to terms with the San Bernardino massacre, gun control is a hot topic across the country. According to a new report from the FBI, Americans have been buying a record number of guns in 2015. But purchasing a gun is only half the battle. When faced with an active shooter situation, or confronted by an intruder, would the average gun owner know what to do?
Retired Navy SEAL Instructor Chris Sajnog trained the world’s deadliest snipers, writing the manual that trained Chris Kyle. Now, he’s using his groundbreaking training program to teach everyday citizens how to protect themselves and their families.
TPM is pleased to announce that we will be awarding our Ninth Annual Golden Dukes on December 31st, in recognition of the year’s best purveyors of public corruption, outlandish behavior and The Crazy.
The awards are named in honor of former Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham, who epitomizes the iconic modern scandal. Each year we single out those practitioners of scandal who through their own unmatched bumbling, shameless behavior, criminality or mere derp have set new standards for public corruption, betrayal of the public trust and general ridiculousness.
And now for the esteemed judges and proud nominees…
Nate Cohn has a good piece in the Times today looking at the reasons why Donald Trump probably won’t be the nominee. And there are very solid arguments ranging from recent history – Newt Gingrich was killing it right now in 2012 – to various more granular arguments about the polls. I confess I’ve struggled with this question a lot – not anything about Trump himself but the predictive question, can he win and do I think he will win? In general, I’ve got a decent record of predicting these things. And that’s mainly because, like a good pilot, when you’re in bad or uncertain conditions, you need to watch your instruments rather than what you see out the window or what you feel.
A stunning coda to that notorious teen sexting case where police sought a warrant to medically induce an erection in one of the suspects and photograph it for comparison purposes.
Pretty much everything people hate about internet commenters is on steroids at FoxNation. So it shouldn’t come as a surprise that one commenter went so far with his threats toward employees of a Planned Parenthood partner that the feds have stepped in and arrested the guy.
Full coverage of tonight’s GOP presidential debate beginning at 6:30 p.m. ET at TPMLivewire.
8:42 PM: It seems like a real disservice to have Kasich and Paul and probably Bush and Christie and Fiorina in this debate.
8:48 PM: Big headline tonight is that Facebook sent a truck around the country to collect videos?
8:53 PM: Under Christie, there will be no bomb hoaxes.
8:56 PM: People feel “left out and out of place in their own country.”
9:01 PM: Cell phones with ISIS flags on them.
9:02 PM: I’ve had a post I’ve been working on for a while about this. But it’s nuts that people are granting to ISIS that is a “caliphate.” It’s cedes a huge advantage to ISIS and grants something that extremely few Muslims do.
9:05 PM: Notable that none of the candidates are willing to say that Trump’s Muslim ban idea is wrong.
9:07 PM: So Cruz totally dodged the question. No one is willing to really disagree with Trump’s Muslim ban.
9:10 PM: For all the outrageousness of the claims of the other candidates, none seems as focused as Christie on trying to make sure everyone is absolutely as scared as possible.
9:15 PM: Watching Rubio on the split screen as Cruz is calling him a liar, he looks weak, uncertain.
9:17 PM: The mix of hyperbole, fear, demands for people to be more afraid is simply crazy. You get used to it if you watch this campaign day in and day out. But it’s worth stepping back and just recognizing that. We’re not in World War III. ISIS will not destroy America. ISIS is not the most sophisticated terrorist group in history.
9:25 PM: Let’s absorb this. If you have one or two people operating independently, self-radicalized, operating as lone-wolves, it’s going to be hard to find every single person like that. This is obvious. It is worth saying this so that we can avoid being totally stupid.
9:30 PM: Also notable, US Attorneys prosecute counter-terrorism cases. But they’re not heads of counter-terrorism in a state like Chris Christie pretends.
9:32 PM: Not sure Ted Cruz understands what ‘carpet bomb’ means.
9:44 PM: “With Jeb’s attitude we will never be great again.”
9:53 PM: “We’ve got a phobia about boots on the ground.”
9:58 PM: Reality check: ISIS controls a decreasing area of territory in Iraq and Syria. It has a limited presence in Libya. It is not ruling territory all over the world or even all over the Middle East.
10:08 PM: The funny thing about Trump is that he has these moments of total clarity and total logic. Like on Syria, you can’t do everything at once. You have to fight ISIS. You can’t be involved on both sides of a civil war at the same time.
10:11 PM: “Time to punch the Russians in the nose.”
10:12 PM: I see little discussion of how a no-fly zone in Syria means telling the Russians to stop their bombing missions or we’ll shoot their planes down.
10:14 PM: “I think if you’re in favor of World War III you have you’re candidate.” Pretty much.
10:19 PM: “I’m at 42 and you’re at 3.”
10:33 PM: I guess the word cloud of this debate has Rubio and Schumer joined as one word.
10:35 PM: So if I understood that right, Ben Carson thinks we should resettle Syrian refugees in Kurdistan?
11:01 PM: So basically Chris Christie was commander-in-chief of New Jersey for seven years.