SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:54 P.M. ET: 

CARTER, TOO? – From Fox:  Defense Secretary Ash Carter used his personal email account to conduct some of his professional correspondence during his first months on the job earlier this year, the Pentagon admitted late Wednesday.  Carter's use of the personal account was first reported by The New York Times, which said that he had been confronted about his email habits by White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough this past May, three months after Carter took office as defense secretary.  Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook released a statement saying that Carter believes his use of personal email for work-related business was a mistake. Cook declined to say whether it was a violation of Pentagon email policies. Cook also said Carter stopped the practice, but Cook did not say when.  Very surprising.  Ash Carter is a good man who knows his way around the Pentagon.  He is probably one of Obama's best appointments.  Hillary Clinton is under FBI investigation for the same abuses of e-mail.  Was this public disclosure involving Carter a way to help Hillary or hurt her?  Very mysterious.

WELL THAT SETTLES IT – From Mediaite:   Hillary Clinton held a campaign event alongside Warren Buffet in Nebraska today, where she jokingly assured Republicans that even though she’s a Democrat, it doesn’t mean she’s some sort of liberal demonic creature of the underworld.  While Clinton was discussing her economic policy positions, she decided to give her attendees some advice if their conservative-leaning acquaintances ever ask what they were doing listening to her. While she told them to hold out hope that she might change their minds, Clinton said that the “first thing you can tell them, as best as you can tell looking under the lights, I don’t have horns.”  Clinton continues to face problems attracting conservative voters, having been deemed by some as untrustworthy, constantly getting lumped in with criticisms of President Obama, and still coming off of how she called Republicans her “enemy.”  I'm relieved.  I never thought Hillary had horns.  A stone heart maybe.  A warped mind.  A violent temper.  But horns?  I'm just a fair-minded commentator, and I haven't seen any evidence of horns.  But if you have, please write.

THIS YOU GOTTA SEE – From Fox:   Trigger warning! This story and video may be unsuitable viewing for the “safe space” crowd.  Looking to understand just how controversial the debate over free speech on our college campuses really is, filmmaker and satirist Ami Horowitz recently traveled to Yale University, one of our nation’s most prestigious institutions of higher learning, to speak directly to students.  “I decided to take this campus free speech debate to its logical conclusion,” said Horowitz, who asked students if they’d sign a petition calling for an outright repeal of the First Amendment. “The result was this unbelievable display of total stupidity.”  In fact, Horowitz discovered a solid majority of the students asked willingly signed the petition, with several expressing their enthusiastic approval for his anti-First Amendment efforts.  Some of these colleges might look into what standards are being applied by their admissions offices.  Or maybe they just don't care.  Yale is one of the most selective schools in the country, but you won't believe the dumbness of some of the comments on the video. 

December 16, 2015