The Patriot Post® · Wednesday Short Cuts

Observations: “Bad news: Quite a few of Trump’s initial hires were terrible people (Bannon), deeply compromised (Flynn), or bad at their jobs (Priebus, Tillerson). Good news: The replacements have been uniformly upgrades. We shouldn’t take that for granted.” —David French

For the record: “Ironically, [Hillary Clinton] claimed that Trump’s voters wouldn’t want an Indian getting ahead. But it was Republican voters in Louisiana and South Carolina who elected Indian-Americans as governors, Donald Trump who appointed an Indian-American as UN Ambassador, and it was Clinton allies who opposed and savaged both Bobby Jindal and Nikki Haley.” —Erick Erickson

Tripling down: “According to polls I’ve seen, it has cost me commercially. That’s not ideal, but I wouldn’t change anything I said. I know my job is, for the most part, to entertain people and make them laugh. That said, if I can be selfish every once in a while and talk about something serious that’s important to me, then I do want to take that opportunity. But I don’t want to abuse my position. I pick my battles.” —Jimmy Kimmel

About time: “I think Vice President Pence is right. I was raised to respect everyone’s religious faith, and I fell short of that. I sincerely apologize for what I said.” —ABC talkinghead Joy Behar issuing a month-overdue coerced apology about making fun of Pence’s Christianity

A “coverup”? That’s cute: “Republican House Intell Comm shut down Russia probe before doing a complete job. This is a coverup and a lasting stain on the reputation of what used to be a bipartisan Committee when it was run by Republican Rogers and Democrat Ruppersberger. Politics beat a desire for the truth.” —Eric Holder tweet

And last… “Waiting for liberals to celebrate Gina Haspel as first female CIA chief… Oh no, wait… liberals can’t celebrate her accomplishments. She’s a REPUBLICAN.” —Liz Wheeler