Finally, Some Good News for Republican Hopes of Keeping the Senate

June 22, 2016

The Quinnipiac poll offers the GOP some good news at a time it really needs it:

Republican incumbent U.S. Senators in three critical swing states fare better today as Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida leads either of two Democratic challengers, while Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey outpoints his Democratic challenger and Ohio Sen. Rob Portman is in a dead heat with a well-known challenger, according to a Quinnipiac University Swing State Poll released today.

In Florida, Sen. Rubio leads U.S. Rep. Patrick Murphy 47 - 40 percent and tops U.S. Rep. Alan Grayson 48 - 40 percent. Murphy and Grayson are ahead of several largely unknown Republican contenders.

This assumes, of course, that Rubio decides he does want to stay in the Senate. The deadline is Thursday.

In Ohio, Sen. Portman ties Ted Strickland, the former governor, 42 - 42 percent in a race that has been too close to call for several months.

In Pennsylvania, Sen. Toomey leads Democratic challenger Katie McGinty 49 - 40 percent.

I should have mentioned this in yesterday's discussion of Quinnipiac's presidential polls: Their latest swing state surveys were conducted "from June 8 – 19." Eleven days of surveying is not ideal; voter views can change in a span of time that long. (Technically, they can change overnight if something dramatic and surprising happens, but that's pretty rare.)

Has a Madman Changed the Course of History, Again?

The referendum in the United Kingdom about leaving the European Union is going to be tense. The Daily Telegraph finds that if you average the last six polls, you get 51 percent for "stay," 49 percent for "leave."

This may be the end of the European Union, even if the vote is narrowly in support of staying: Political parties in Italy, France, Holland and Denmark are calling for their own referendums on leaving. Talk about a vote of no confidence.

Julia Hartley-Brewer makes the closing argument for leaving the European Union:

If you're one of the millions of Britons who is still undecided as to how to vote in the EU referendum, then there is just one word that you should think about before you cast your vote on Thursday: trust.

Who do you trust to run this country? Who do you trust to make the best decisions for your family, your business and your community? Because, fundamentally, that is what this referendum is about.

This referendum isn't about deciding which politicians you trust or which experts or which business people you trust. It's about whether you trust yourself.

Whether it's the economy, trade, jobs, immigration or security that tops your list of concerns, this referendum is about whether you trust yourself and the rest of the British people to run this country or whether you think it's better if we hand over our democratic powers to someone else.

Conservatives disagree on what Margaret Thatcher would do in this situation:

But would Thatcher be in favor of remaining in the European Union or leaving it? David Cameron says Thatcher, one of the creators of the single market, would obviously have been In. Boris Johnson says that as the prime minister who screamed "No, No, No" to the push in 1990 to turn the common market into a political union, she would have obviously been Out. Europe is the fault line running through Tory politics and both sides claim to follow the footsteps of Thatcher's ghost.

One big question will be whether the assassination of Labour Member of Parliament Jo Cox will sway voters. Nicola Sturgeon, leader of the Scottish National Party, thinks it will:

Speaking to the Guardian on Monday, as the Westminster parliament paid tribute to the 41-year-old Labour MP who was fatally attacked in her West Yorkshire constituency last Thursday, Sturgeon said: "I think it inevitably will [affect voting decisions]. It's too early to say whether it will have a direct impact on the result. I think there was a bit of disgust setting in on Thursday morning about the Farage poster. I started to detect a sense of 'if you're voting leave, are you associating yourself with that?".

"Obviously nobody knows whether the debate around the referendum had anything to do with what happened to Jo, but the sense that the debate had become a little bit poisonous and a little bit intolerant and focused on fear of foreigners as opposed to legitimate debate about immigration, I suspect what happened will have intensified those feelings."

You couldn't have asked for an assassin to fit a stereotype any clearer:

The brutal killing of British lawmaker Jo Cox in northern England last week, allegedly at the hands of a suspect who witnesses said yelled "Britain first" during the attack, has drawn attention to far-right extremist groups centered in the region.

Prosecutors have said in court that "material of an extremist, far-right nature" was found at the home of Thomas Mair, the 52-year-old man accused of shooting and stabbing Ms. Cox on Thursday. On Monday, they said his case would be treated as terrorism-related.

When he appeared in a London courtroom on Saturday, he gave his name as "Death to traitors, freedom for Britain." Mr. Mair hasn't entered a plea and a judge has ordered him to be given a psychiatric evaluation.

John Wilkes Booth, Gavrilo Princip, Lee Harvey Oswald, James Earl Ray, and now perhaps Thomas Mair – angry, violent, disturbed men who altered the direction of history.

(What's with assassins' being known by all three names?)

As Instapundit Likes to Say, 'We're In the Very Best of Hands'

The rumor that Omar Mateen's wife, Noor Salman, had disappeared broke Friday, but it seemed too preposterous to believe. Come on, how would the Federal Bureau of Investigation let a potential accomplice in the worst terrorist attack On American soil since 9/11 just walk out the door with no surveillance? Unthinkable, right? Apparently not:

Attorney General Loretta Lynch admitted today that the FBI is unaware of the whereabouts of Omar Mateen's wife, Noor Salman.

Salman has indicated she suspected Mateen was about to commit a terrorist attack, and even accompanied him to buy the weaponry he used to carry out the massacre. She insists, however, that as he left she tried to hold onto his arm so he wouldn't leave.

If the FBI believes she was aware of the impending attack, she could be prosecuted.

"Has the shooter's wife left the state of Florida?" a reporter asked Lynch during her press conference Tuesday.

"Right now, I don't know exactly the answer to that," Lynch candidly replied. "I believe she was going to travel but I do not know exactly her location now."

Wait, it gets better. Yesterday Lynch said, "I cannot tell you definitively that we will ever narrow it down to one motivation. People often act out of more than one motivation. This was clearly an act of terror and an act of hate. So we will look at all motivations, and hopefully come to a conclusion there."

What, is her theory that the pledge of loyalty to ISIS was just a cover story for his anti-gay views?

Orlando Police Dispatcher (OD): Emergency 911, this is being recorded.

Shooter (OM): In the name of God the Merciful, the beneficial [in Arabic]

OD: What?

OM: Praise be to God, and prayers as well as peace be upon the prophet of God [in Arabic]. I let you know, I'm in Orlando and I did the shootings.

OD: What's your name?

OM: My name is I pledge of allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi of the Islamic State.

OD: Ok, What's your name?

OM: I pledge allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi may God protect him [Arabic], on behalf of the Islamic State.

OD: Alright, where are you at?

OM: In Orlando.

OD: Where in Orlando?

[End of call.]

Apparently everyone in Florida reported Mateen to the FBI at some point.

Mohammad Malik says he warned the FBI about nightclub shooter Omar Mateen two years ago.

Shortly after Abu-Salha launched his attack in May 2014, Malik heard Mateen talk about al-Awlaki's videos. Malik says he then called the FBI.

"He told me they were very powerful," he recalled. "That raised the red flag even higher for me."

At least one Homeland Security employee is locked and loaded and . . . wait, ready to launch his own attack?

Federal prosecutors are investigating whether a Department of Homeland Security employee with top-secret clearance was planning an attack at the agency's Washington headquarters when he entered the building with a gun, a knife, an infrared camera, pepper spray and handcuffs.

Jonathan Wienke, and analyst in the Office of Intelligence and Analysis, allegedly carried the weapons into the building on the morning of June 9. Court documents filed by the federal government state that investigators have probable cause to believe Wienke "was conspiring with another to commit workplace violence, and more particularly may have been conspiring or planning to commit violence against senior DHS officials in the building."

Relax, everyone! The employee has been released and placed on administrative leave!

ADDENDA: A thoroughly depressing middle of the week. The good news for me? Twin Peaks co-creator Mark Frost's novel, The Secret History of Twin Peaks, goes on sale October 18. Minor SPOILERS for the upcoming Showtime series ahead:

"Twenty-five years [after Dale Cooper's investigation of the murder of Laura Palmer,] the FBI gets a hold of a box it won't divulge the provenance of. In the box, a huge dossier . . .

A female FBI agent is tasked to analyze all the documents inside, and everything related to the strange town of Twin Peaks. She also has to determine the identity of the person who compiled the dossier. Along the way, she discovers secrets about the lives of the town's residents, but also investigative reports from Dale Cooper who has since vanished, newspaper clippings, an autopsy report, and other classified information.

What happened since the death of the young woman? And why did an anonymous "archivist" compile such a thorough dossier on Twin Peaks and its origins?"