NewsNation Chief Washington Anchor and On Balance host Leland Vittert was a foreign correspondent for four years in Jerusalem. He gives you an early look at tonight’s 7 p.m. ET show.

99% of America Wants Ivy League Universities to Feel Pain 

Who knows how long the presidents of Harvard, MIT and the University of Pennsylvania will last, but that’s really besides the point. Their bizarre rationalization and contextualization of calls for genocide on their campus comes not only from antisemitism but the far deeper cancer of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) orthodoxy on college campuses. 

• The real question: Who will replace them? Will it be another DEI hire like Bill Ackman alleges the president of Harvard was?
• Or will the pro-Hamas movement kill DEI?
• Go deeper: Heather Mac Donald (@HMDatMI) writes in the Wall Street Journal, “DEI Drives Campus Antisemitism.”
  • Looking at the president’s testimony through a DEI lens explains everything. The university presidents all said essentially the same thing: Calls for genocide against Jews may or may not be harrassment depending on the “context.”
    • The truth: Some crisis manager had the bright idea of making everybody happy rather than speaking with moral clarity. This explains the president’s refrain, “it depends on the context.”
    • The Problem: You can’t “both-sides” calls for genocide.

Thought bubble: The pro-Hamas protests will (hopefully) end DEI on college campus because DEI doesn’t protect all minorities. For example, it actively excludes Jews.

• Bill Ackman compared DEI to McCarthyism 2.0. Like McCarthyism, DEI is un-American. The use of DEI to protect Hamas terrorists has laid that bare in a way even the DEI folks can’t and won’t defend.

Go deeper: Watch last night’s segment about the University of Pennsylvania president’s testimony. 

Watch tonight: World renowned crisis manager Eric Dezenhall will back the curtain on the conversations and media training that went into the disastrous testimony.

We All Pay Taxes…Except for Hunter Biden

Hunter Biden faces 17 years in jail on charges of tax evasion.

• Victor Nava of the New York Post lays out the insane life of a man spending nearly $400,000 per year on prostitutes and $3,000 per day on ATM withdrawals.
  • Do the Math
    • Hunter Biden spent on average $500 a day on “various women” over four years. One of those years was his first year of marriage to his new wife. 

Pretty Rich: 

• Hunter Biden’s attorney Abbe Lowell issued a statement saying, “Based on the facts and the law, if Hunter’s last name was anything other than Biden, the charges in Delaware, and now California, would not have been brought.”
  • Shot : That’s interesting considering Democrats keep saying no one is above the law.
  • Chaser : The better question is whether Hunter Biden would have gotten any of these jobs if his “last name was anything other than Biden.”

This Isn’t Disgusting….This is War

CNN opened a morning show report complaining about, “New and disgusting images this morning showing the Israeli military detaining dozens of men in Gaza that are seen stripped down to their underwear.”

Colby Hall wrote a great piece in Mediaite about the segment.

CNN’s Ben Wedeman responded saying, “This is not, although the image is disturbing, it’s not the first time this has happened.”

The facts: This is war. Hamas fighters wear civilian clothing and sometimes surrender only to blow themselves up with suicide vests. It makes perfect sense that the IDF orders surrendered or captured fighters to strip to their underwear. 

• War is hell. 
  • Thought bubble 💭: Poppy Harlow was never a foreign correspondent  so she doesn’t know what war is actually like. Wedeman knows better, but like many, holds Israel to an impossible double standard. 
• Dig deeper: Some on the left already compare this to Gitmo…as if that is a bad thing. Have we learned nothing from 22 years of fighting terrorists? 

Hate Crimes You DON’T Hear About

Amanda Woods (@Words_by_Woods) of The New York Post reports, “A stranger pummeled a Jewish man dressed in traditional religious garb and called him a ‘dirty Jew’ before snatching his cell phone in Brooklyn late Thursday – on the first evening of Hanukkah, cops said.”

• Facts: We have an actual hate crime here where a Jewish man is attacked for being Jewish on the first night of Hanukkah. 
• Remember: Three Palestinians were shot in Vermont a week ago in what the media labeled a hate crime without any proof. 
• The result: The actual crime against a Jew isn’t covered. The maybe-hate crime against Palestinians is non-stop national news. 
• Watch tonight 📺: We analyze how long it take governors, the White House and network news programs to respond to possible hate crimes against Palestinians rather than actual hate crimes against Jews. 

One more for the road. 

• A Muslim man yelling “Free Palestine” fires a shotgun outside a temple with kids inside and receives zero coverage.
• Thought bubble 💭: If this had been a mosque during Ramadan rather than a temple during Hanukkah every network newscast would have a correspondent tonight discussing the fears of Islamophobia. 

Solving the Housing Crisis

The exploding costs of single family homes and rent since the pandemic (up 30% or more in some places) doesn’t come from an explosion of demand, but more likely from a concerted effort by hedge funds to make more money.

• Thought bubble: America shouldn’t allow billionaires to get richer by putting the American dream out of reach for hard-working Americans. That isn’t fair.
• Thanks to some excellent reporting by Ronda Kaysen (@rondakaysen) and Ella Koeze (@ellawinthrop) of The New York Times about hedge funds pricing home buyers out of the real estate market and driving up housing costs, a new bill would put major restrictions on hedge funds owning single family houses. 

Watch tonight : Democratic Representative Adam Smith of Washington (@RepAdamSmith) will discuss his bill and how it would help return fairness to the basic American dream. 

Why Everybody Gets A’s These Days 

Turns out grade inflation comes from professors afraid to fairly grade their students.

• How it works: Joey gets a B. He and his parents accuse the professor of racism, sexism, Islamophobia, fat-shaming or not caring that his pet ferret died two years ago. 
• Amelia Nierenberg (@AJNierenberg) of The New York Times reports, “Nearly 80% of all grades given to undergraduates at Yale last academic year were A’s or A minuses.” 

Watch tonight : A professor will speak on the threats and fears they face when giving kids fair grades and why it’s easy to just give everyone A’s. 

Tune into “On Balance with Leland Vittert” weeknights at 7/6C on NewsNation. Find your channel here.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and not necessarily of NewsNation.