RealClearInvestigations' Picks of the Week
Nov. 26 to Dec. 2 Featured Investigation "You went to Lee High? What's that?" High school reunions may get a little more complicated in the years ahead as a growing number of schools named in honor of Confederate leaders change their monikers. While the push to remove Confederate flags and monuments from public spaces has received wide attention, there's a quieter movement apace at the nation's elementary, middle and high schools. The Southern Poverty Law Center identified 109 schools with Confederate-inspired school names in April 2016. -Robert E. Lee led the pack, accounting for nearly half of those, with Stonewall Jackson and Jefferson Davis a distant second and third with 15 and 13 namesake schools. Since then at least 19 have embraced new, less historically freighted names, with many more considering changes. Clark reports that this movement seems to be growing even though public polling shows most Americans - and especially large majorities in the South - oppose the erasure of Confederate history from public areas. She writes: ... School name debates are expanding into the heart of Dixie. Huntsville, Ala., for one, is seeing a surge in name-change sentiment. "The name of our school should stand for unification, rather than separation," said a student at the local Lee High School, in a video collection of student pleas for a name change. The accompanying Change.org petition proposes renaming the school after Paulette Turner, who in 1964 became its first black student. As recently as 2011, however, suggestions by then-Superintendent Casey Wardynski to rename the school while transitioning to a new building were shot down by students and community members.
Read Full Article Other Noteworthy Articles and Series
Dueling Interpretations of Flynn Guilty Plea
CNBC, National Review
Former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn copped a plea of guilty to lying to the FBI about Russian contacts during the post-election presidential transition -- and the news got strikingly different interpretations. Mainstream liberal media played it as a major turning point indeed, perhaps a sign that a newly cooperative Flynn, to save his skin, would soon provide evidence of illegal collusion with Moscow reaching into Donald Trump's inner circle and perhaps to the President himself. Conservative analysts, notably former federal prosecutor Andrew C. McCarthy in National Review, suggested special counsel Robert Mueller nailed Flynn on an investigative "process crime" because he was grasping at straws. Flynn Nuke Push Went Deep Into White House
Wall Street Journal
Separately, it emerged that during Michael Flynn's brief tenure as national security adviser, he promoted a controversial Middle East nuclear-power plan backed by private-sector interests who had paid him. He went so far as sending a draft memo for President Trump to sign authorizing the project. Sexual Harassment Allegations Continue
Real Clear Investigations
New evidence of libidos of fame with feet of clay emerged as three more accomplished men - "Today" show host Matt Lauer, NPR icon Garrison Keillor, and hip hop mogul Russell Simmons - saw their careers implode over charges of sexual coercion and lewd behavior. New accusers alleged misconduct by Sen. Al Franken and Rep. John Conyers. Also, NPR, CNN and Vice News fired employees over harassment allegations. And entertainer Bette Midler repeated her 1991 claim that Geraldo Rivera, now of Fox News, groped her. Criticized for defending Lauer with a rationalization that the news was a "flirty business," Rivera apologized to Midler and other women. Evidence U.S. Killed then Covered Up 10 Civilian Deaths in Somalia
Daily Beast
A U.S.-led operation in Somalia resulted in the death of 10 civilians, including one child, the Daily Beast reports. It also reports that U.S. special operation forces fired on unarmed civilians; used human intelligence from sources widely considered untrustworthy ,and instructed their Somali counterparts to collect weapons that were being stored inside a home and place them beside the bodies of those killed prior to photographing them. Terry McAuliffe and Tony Rodham Sued Over Green Card ‘Scam'
Politico
Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe and former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's brother Anthony Rodham are being sued for $17 million by a group of Chinese investors who claim they were defrauded in a cash-for-green card "scam." Email Investigator Says He Faced Clinton Campaign Threats
Fox News
An Obama appointee who investigated Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server says he, his family and his staff faced an intense backlash at the time from Clinton allies - and that the campaign even put out word that it planned to fire him if the Democratic presidential nominee won the 2016 election. Creeping Quackery in Cancer Care
Ars Technica
More than 60 percent of National Institutes of Health-supported comprehensive centers in the U.S. offer a range of medically questionable treatments under the rubric of "integrative medicine." The number of centers providing patients with information on "healing touch"—a type of "energy medicine"—increased nearly 30 percent between 2009 and 2016. Similarly, Ayurveda—an ancient Indian pseudoscience involving herbal, mineral, and metal treatments—increased by 10 percent in the same time frame. The World Is Drowning in (Actual) Garbage
Washington Post
The world produces more than 3.5 million tons of garbage a day — and that figure is growing. By 2050, there will be so much plastic refuse floating in the ocean, it will outweigh the fish. The Washington Post uses remarkable words, pictures and videos to tell the growing story of garbage in six cities: Jakarta, New York, Lagos, Tokyo, Sao Paulo and London. | 
