FRIDAY short TAKES.

Buckle in, if the first few installations of this series set a trend, it's going to be a rough year.  Solar Panels in Gaza Can’t Withstand Bombs.  "The question of Palestine undoubtedly encompasses racial, economic, health, gender, queer, and carceral dimensions. At the nexus of these intersectional issues is the environmental concern. In Gaza, limited access to food, land, water, and electricity are not just infrastructure problems, they are pressing environmental concerns that intersect with larger social justice issues."  Read that and weep, that's the quality of analysis that got Rozina Kanchwala a Fulbright.

Fortunately, more people are discovering the affirmative action asterisk.  "We will also begin devoting special attention to minority employees of limited qualifications to make them genuinely productive in the shortest possible time. Hopefully we can maintain standards of performance throughout."  Translated:  "[Diversity hiring] demands that less qualified minorities be hired instead of more qualified white and Asian men and, often, women. That is the whole point. DEI doesn’t 'tackle' discrimination, it viciously implements discrimination."  The scam isn't working any more.  "Claudine Gay is simply the latest beneficiary of a leftwing intellectual privilege that not only excuses away research misconduct—it also attempts to shift the blame onto the parties who made the discovery, no matter the validity of the evidence."

The adults are up for re-election.  "In real life, Biden went on to oversee crisis after crisis—record-high inflation, record-high illegal immigration, a disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan—even as he stone-walled the press, dodged accountability, and tamped down on online criticism. Nevertheless, sympathetic news outlets have continued to defer to Biden and his technocrats."  Like the Bears, they still suck.  "Amazingly, the same team that brought us the border, inflation, and the Afghanistan disaster is still on the playing field. And it keeps racking up the L’s."

Mine is not a sympathetic news outlet.  Turf them out.

The weekly round-up of pithy elaborations of traditional Cold Spring Shops themes follows.

1.  Diversity is a luxury good.

2.  Make 'em play by their own rules.  "Hostile environment harassment claims may be brought by whites as much as by non-whites."

3.  Shout hurrah, clap your hands.  "The sudden interest in women’s football thus has a bogus feel about it, like the simulated enthusiasm of a crowd for the dictator in a communist state."

4.  You say it's in the Constitution?  "Several Republicans seemed almost shocked that Democrats were willing to call out Biden for violating the Constitution."

5.  You say gnosis or shibboleth, I call bull-puckey.  "A lot of philosophical verbiage—particularly for intellectuals who believe that philosophy should be used as a weapon or tool of political engagement—is intended to buy authority unearned by argument. The language used to justify their power also serves to protect their authority to use it."

6.  The day the decarbonization died.  "Imagine that your carbon tax is a useless sacrifice on the altar of Gaia."

7.  The odds are, it's slacking.  "I have a difficult time differentiating between legitimate mental health issues and making excuses."

8.  Hint: they're not sewer socialists.  "Any clue which political party and what kind of people have run big American cities for more than five decades?"

9.  Desperately seeking Donald Trump? "I think it always had a half-life. … And right now, the problem is on our watch. And whatever’s happening, it’s Biden’s responsibility, and there’s a sense that things are slipping out of control again."

10.  Trading off ability for diversity.  "Incompetence resulting from DEI policies may sour your shopping experience at Lululemon, but it won’t cost you your life."

11.  Democracy.  "The problem is the Democratic Party only cares about their votes, and that's why we need to take this to the polls."

12.  It's always the rent seeking.  "In a better Washington, there would be no subsidies for EV chargers. The market would meet demand, as it did with gasoline stations. But we live in the age of subsidy."

13.  Evergreen.  "Urban planners have not shown any particular skills at, you know, urban planning, as the squalid state of our cities today indicates."

14.  If not the urban planners, the Anointed.  "Groupthink is choking the city on its own filth, the conceit that there are only progressive solutions to any problem or, worse, that people don't deserve solutions to the city's self-inflicted problems."

15.  Restore a state of good repair, and the cultural problem will take care of itself.  "It is like we are creating the perfect conditions for a nasty backlash against addiction, mental illness, and homelessness."

16.  Davos: Poverty for thee but not for me.

17.  Just another day of dementia.  "Biden does enough terrible things we don't need to make stuff up."

18.  It's the Stupid Credentialed Classes.  "If enough people say, 'What is wrong with you people, did you not see 10/7, Putin in Ukraine, Abbey Gate?' the clap back at elites could be thunderous."

19.  Progressive Intolerance.  "The teachers unions and the far left politicians do not want scrutiny, so they use incendiary language to smear those who ask questions to shut them down preemptively."

20.  Climate change?  "They called it Wisconsin weather."

21.  Draft and develop.  "For Bears fans, that’s just so very wrong."  Then play with growing confidence.  "Green Bay is going to be a problem for that division and that conference and this league for a long time."

22.  Down but never out.  Now run to win.  "Running the ball effectively is the quickest way to defang a defense."