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NANOTECHNOLOGY UPDATE: Novel silicon nanostructure extends battery life.

IS THERE ANYTHING IT CAN’T DO? Drink coffee, live longer. “After years of waffling research on coffee and health, even some fear that java might raise the risk of heart disease, a big study finds the opposite: Coffee drinkers are a little more likely to live longer. Regular or decaf doesn’t matter. The study of 400,000 people is the largest ever done on the issue, and the results should reassure any coffee lovers who think it’s a guilty pleasure that may do harm. . . . Coffee drinkers were less likely to die from heart or respiratory disease, stroke, diabetes, injuries, accidents or infections. No effect was seen on cancer death risk, though. Other research ties coffee drinking to lower levels of markers for inflammation and insulin resistance.”

Note: A 600-calorie mochalatte may not have the same effect. . . .

A SMART PHONE THAT CAN sniff out sickness?

WHAT EVERYONE NEEDS: Finally, a Spray That Gets You Instantly Drunk for Just a Few Seconds.

GOOD GRIEF: ‘Queen’s knickers’ up for grabs on eBay. “It is alleged the bloomer-style knickers, which have not been confirmed as authentic by any official sources, were left on a private aeroplane during the Queen’s visit to Chile in 1968.”

AN EPIDEMIC OF fake hair.

VIDEO: Seven Times in 2008 Obama Promised To Create 7 Million New Jobs.

Related: Six Times Obama Promised To Cut The Deficit.

HORSE/BARN DOOR: Biden muzzled: Staffers pulling reporters off line. But does this suggest that Obama might replace Biden on the ticket? That would signify. . . .

A READER BOOK PLUG REQUEST: Alexander Neill writes:

I’ve been a reader since 2002 and recently leapt into the world of Kindle publishing with a fantasy trilogy entitled Kaunovalta. The first book, The Running Girl, has received a very favourable review from someone in North Carolina, and all three have begun to sell in North America, the UK and Germany. I’d be most grateful for a mention on your site!

The trilogy can be found here at the Amazon Kindle Store, and features elves, dwarves, dragons, comedy, tragedy, magic, monsters, and love triumphant. No bit with a dog, though.

Too bad. I hear they’re delicious.

A RIFLE REVIEW: THE REMINGTON R15 VTR.

GIVE EARLY AND OFTEN: Rand Simberg has launched a Kickstarter project: Rationalizing Our Approach To Safety In Space. I donated.

IN THE MAIL: From Michael Cook, God Is…

MICKEY KAUS: “Warren Buffett has bought $256.5 million of GM stock for his firm Berkshire Hathaway. Did he buy it to make money, or to help Obama**? Or is he, in an ominous corporatist mixture of the two, investing in Obama? Does even Buffett know for sure at this point?”

UNEXPECTEDLY! Index of U.S. Leading Economic Indicators Falls 0.1%.

LIZ PEEK: How California Unions Hijacked The Golden State.

CANDLEPOWER EQUALS AUTHORITY: So I bought this LED flashlight, and tried it out last night. It works pretty well — on a dark night, it illuminated houses and trees a couple of blocks away. That’s useful in a variety of circumstances. (My brother, once a nighttime caretaker at a nature park, used to say that at night “candlepower equals authority.”) It’s very solidly built, though if you want a flashlight that doubles as a billyclub you’re probably better off with one of the big 6-D-cell Maglites.

I kinda wish I’d sprung for the 1000 lumen model now, though.

SPOILING JULIA ROTTEN: The Democrats’ Clientism Problem.

This Ramirez cartoon says it all.

UH OH: Hundreds of “Superflares” Spotted in Sun-Like Stars.

Whenever a big solar storm appears, it necessarily comes with the looming threat that the Big One, aimed at our planet in just the right way, could overload the power grid and generally set civilization back a few centuries. While we should be thankful that hasn’t happened, we should also be thankful that our sun doesn’t seem as temperamental as some similar stars.

A study out today in Nature reveals hundreds of “superflares” from stars the same class as the sun. These flares can be thousands or even millions of times more energetic than the largest recorded one to strike Earth, the 1859 Carrington event that wreaked havoc with telegraph systems. The planet-hunting Kepler telescope spotted the huge events. While staring at a field of space for about four months, Kepler saw 83,000 stars of the same class as the sun, and saw a total of 365 superflares, which came from 148 of the stars.

I’m not sure the news is as reassuring as this story makes it sound, since the mechanism behind these flares remains obscure.

UPDATE: Sky and Telescope says don’t worry. Still unclear on the mechanism, though.

SECRET SERVICE UPDATE: Cartagena prostitution scandal is no laughing matter to Secret Service alumni. Well, they should be embarrassed, especially as this wasn’t just one isolated incident. As I’ve noted here before, the Secret Service has had problems for many years.

RATS ON HIGH FRUCTOSE DIET have impaired memories.

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Also, today only: A Haan Professional Garment Steamer for $69.99.

INSTAVISION: I talk with AEI President Arthur Brooks about his new book, The Road To Freedom. I’d certainly rather travel that road than the one to serfdom that we’re on now . . .

“SMART DIPLOMACY:” Chen Affair Exposes the Limits of U.S. Influence in China.

ROLL CALL: FreedomWorks Backs Three Upstarts for Open House Seats. “The group endorsed Public Service Commissioner Kevin Cramer in North Dakota’s at-large seat; Lewis County Judge Executive Thomas Massie in Kentucky’s 4th district; and former state Sen. Sam Aanestad in California’s 1st district. All three candidates are running in open-seat races. FreedomWorks’ support is notable because it’s backing the underdogs in each race and, in one case, going against the state party’s endorsement.”

EXPECTING AN EARTH-SHATTERING KABOOM: NASA counts 4,700 potentially hazardous near-Earth asteroids.

THE HILL: Energy Dept. loan probe could ensnare two Cabinet secretaries. “House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) wants to hear from two Cabinet officials — Commerce Secretary John Bryson and Energy Secretary Steven Chu — as part of an investigation into the Energy Department’s loan program.”

ED MORRISSEY: Obama’s Growing Credibility Gap with Mainstream Voters. “The problem for Obama and the Left this time is that they have to make an actual sales pitch – and judging from their efforts, they don’t know how to talk effectively enough to middle America to succeed at it. This problem starts at the top.”

UPDATE: From Clive Crook at The Atlantic: “Obama’s big problem, I think, is that he is no longer the president he said he would be. Above all, he’s stopped trying to be that president.” Yep.

INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY: ALEC And The Left’s War On Free Speech.

If you want an insight into today’s left, look at its multifront war against the American Legislative Exchange Council for committing the grave sin of pushing free-market bills in state legislatures.

At a recent meeting in Washington, Aniello Alioto of ProgressNow Colorado summed up the left-wing’s campaign against ALEC: “Never relent, never let up pressure, and always increase.”

According to the Washington Free Beacon, ProgressNow was one of several left-wing groups meeting at ALF-CIO headquarters earlier this month to plot their ongoing campaign against ALEC. Other groups included Common Cause and the Color of Change.

So what’s got the left so agitated? Is ALEC involved in organized crime? Has it stolen money from state treasuries? Bribed officials? Polluted the environment? Clubbed baby seals?

Nope. The left is targeting ALEC for the simple reason that it’s been effective in promoting pro-business, free-market ideas and policies, mainly by drafting model legislation that lawmakers can use as a template in their own legislatures.

Dissent cannot be tolerated.

EUROPE: Moody’s Warns Spain It Will Downgrade “More Than 21″ Spanish Banks.

Related: Nationalized Spanish Bank Plummets On News Of Bank Run.

POLITICAL SCIENCE: Collapse In Trust Is A Good Predictor Of Collapse In Governments. “That is the real story here. We asked people whether they trusted government officials in their country to tell the truth about a difficult issue and the results were abysmal. In nearly every country surveyed, government leaders were less trusted to tell the truth than business leaders. However, European countries were far more likely than countries in other regions to say they do not trust government leaders at all to tell the truth.”

JAMES PETHOKOUKIS: The 3 economic charts that could crash Obama’s reelection hopes.

JON LOVITZ: People are calling me a Nazi for thinking I already pay my fair share of taxes.

RAND SIMBERG: The Death of the Hockey Stick? The iconic symbol of the global warming panic may have taken a hit from which it will never recover.

FASTER, PLEASE: Brain Implant Allows Paralyzed Woman To Control Robot With Her Thoughts.

JIM TREACHER: Don’t worry, America: David Letterman still hates George W. Bush.

Wait: David Letterman is still alive? Who knew?

THE RETURN OF Carmageddon?

HOW’S THAT HOPEY-CHANGEY STUFF WORKIN’ OUT FOR YA? (CONT’D): Obama Budget: 99 Senators Against, 0 For.

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IN RESPONSE TO LAST NIGHT’S SCUBA POST, reader Dave Parmly emails:

Great observations. My gear is bought from the Boy Scout Sea Base (used for one season…mint condition) for $300 (BC, weight belt/weights, all regs and hoses, Suunto depth/press/compass computer…can’t beat that price. “Rental Quality”…means it’s durable and reliable. Having your own gear makes it FAR more likely that I’ll dive on family trips to Florida. Both my sons have done the dive thing at the Boy Scout Sea Base on Islamorada in the Keys. Great program. Last time was a live-aboard on a sail boat. Awesome to leave land and not come back for a week.

UT has a superb non-credit SCUBA course. It’s NAUI, and boy do they drill and drill and drill…our 16-18 year olds could do everything in their sleep. Very comforting for dads and moms watching their babies go into a potentially lethal environment with every dive. We’ve put over 20 young men and a few adults through it. Many moms have told me how impressed they are in their “scatter-brained” teenagers ability to focus intently when assembling their gear. I say “Well, tell the kid they might die and it gets most kids attention.”

It’s a cool thing to watch “kids” handle the potentially dangerous implications of diving. Of course, I fall into the camp of “You have to expose young men to death and danger as a part of their growth” school. If it’s not done under controlled circumstances, they will seek it under out-of-control circumstances.

Yes, I got my nephew certified when he was 12. He went on to get his helicopter license before he was 18.

TOM MAGUIRE: Zimmerman Case – Keeping Hate Alive At The Times. They’re really pulling out all the stops to ensure the lynching of a black man, aren’t they?

SHOCKER: 53,000 dead voters found in Florida.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Astroturfing in Texas? “Bottom line: the widely reported ‘I stand with Bill Powers’ Facebook effort was not an organic display of support. It was, however, publicly held out by the organizers as organic.”

WISCONSIN: New Marquette Law School poll has Walker ahead by 6 percentage points (and Romney and Obama tied in Wisconsin).

Don’t get cocky, kid.

HMM: Robert Kennedy Jr.’s estranged wife found dead.

21ST CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: 12% of Moms Using Smartphones During Sex. “What are they using their phones for during sex? Well, the survey didn’t get that specific. We may never know if they’re texting details to their friends, updating their Facebook status or checking email while gettin’ busy in the bedroom.”

HAPPY National Masturbation Month.

THE PROBLEM IS, NOBODY’S AFRAID OF HIM ANY MORE: Obama’s plan to ‘crucify’ political opponents: Targeting Romney donors is meant to scare away others. But if Tea Party folk want to put some heat on some Obama donors, that would only be fair, I suppose.

21ST CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: “Your Husband Is Gay And Everyone Knows It.”

21ST CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: One-Night Stand Etiquette: Who Should Cover Birth Control?

UPDATE: A whole flock of readers responds with variations on “the government!” and “Georgetown University!”

HOW’S THAT HOPEY-CHANGEY STUFF WORKIN’ OUT FOR YA? (CONT’D): “By a margin of nearly two to one, Americans expect their children’s jobs, salaries and benefits to be worse than their own. Some 35% go so far as to say that America’s best days are behind it.” I think that’s wrong, but only if we get rid of the current gang in Washington.

SCIENCE: Why Women Choose Bad Boys. “Women choose bad boys because their hormones make them, new research suggests. When ovulating a woman’s hormones influence who she sees as good potential fathers, and they specifically pick sexier men over obviously more dependable men. . . . Under the hormonal influence of ovulation, women delude themselves into thinking that the sexy bad boys will become devoted partners and better dads.”

NOW OUT: From Dave Kopel, et al., Firearms Law & the Second Amendment; Regulation, Rights, and Policy.

ROGER SIMON: Is Obama Imploding?

Roger Kimball: Obama By The Numbers.

Related: Alarm Grows Among Dems About Obama’s Chances.

Don’t get cocky, kid.

BECOMING YOUR OWN WEIGHT LOSS BOSS. I favor the Gary Taubes approach myself, with a strong admixture of Mark Rippetoe. A calorie-counting app (I use Livestrong) is also helpful.

LIKE THE FEMINISTS DID FOR BILL CLINTON BACK IN 1998. Van Jones: Yeah, we enviros took a dive for Obama during the Gulf oil spill.

What’s the environmentalist equivalent of a Groper’s Support Group? Er, all of ‘em, I guess. . . .

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21ST CENTURY REPRODUCTION: Parents Are Paying To Freeze Their Adult Daughters’ Eggs.

AN INTERVIEW WITH NAOMI SCHAEFER RILEY, author of The Faculty Lounges: And Other Reasons Why You Won’t Get The College Education You Pay For.

FASTER, PLEASE: Latest simulation shows that the magnetic nozzles required for antimatter propulsion could be vastly more efficient than previously thought–and built with today’s technologies.

LONGEVITY UPDATE: Gene Therapy Extends Mouse Lifespan.

WITH LUCK, BY THEN THE U.S. WILL BE THE WORLD’S BIGGEST OIL EXPORTER: IMF Sees Oil Price Doubling in 10 Years.

ANOTHER READER BOOK PLUG: Night Music, by Tobias Cabral.

FAILING THE TEST: Teen Arrested After Homework Left At Crime Scene.

AT THE LONDON OLYMPICS, a “mankini?”

FASTER, PLEASE: New Drug Trial Seeks to Stop Alzheimer’s Before It Starts.

THIS IS THE WAY the Higher Education Bubble ends. “The higher education bubble ends with inevitable disaggregation of classes from the universities that offer them, and soon.”

Someone should write a book on this subject.

A HARBINGER? Life Under Capital Controls. Jim Bennett emails: “This article is interesting first as a comment on the strength of the economy of the more pro-capitalist part of North America, and second as a picture of life in Iceland under capital controls. People read the term but younger readers have no real feel for what it means in terms of day-to-day life. There have been no capital controls in Europe since the fall of the Berlin Wall, and none in Western Europe for some time before that. But even Britain had capital controls for quite some time after WW2.” Yes, and by a curious coincidence, the U.S. government has been making it steadily more difficult for Americans to move money offshore.

IN THE MAIL: From Peter Berkowitz, Israel and the Struggle over the International Laws of War.

WALTER RUSSELL MEAD: Home HIV Test about Putting Patients in Charge of Health. “According to the Washington Post, the FDA is currently considering approval of a new home HIV test, which could be purchased over the counter and administered within 20 minutes by performing a simple gum swab. . . . Beyond the AIDS struggle, giving people more control over their health is a necessary part of creating a sustainable health care system in this country. A dependency culture—waiting passively for the doctors to take care of it—both infantilizes people and raises costs. Naturally, there are limits to how much responsibility you can expect from people, but a health care system that unnecessarily restricts individual choice and costs so much that it will bankrupt the country is also a bad idea. More power in health care and more responsibility needs to go to individuals; they will sometimes make bad decisions, but doctors and public health ‘experts’ are also mistaken from time to time.”

Indeed they are.

CIVIL RIGHTS UPDATE: Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin signs open-carry gun bill into law. “Oklahoma is the 25th state with either ‘permissive open carry’ laws, which means no permit required, or ‘licensed open carry,’ which requires a permit. Oklahoma now joins Utah, North Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Indiana, Tennessee, Georgia, Mississippi, New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Hawaii and Massachusetts as a ‘licensed open carry’ state.”

PORKBUSTERS UPDATE: Earmarks Still Have Friends In High Places.

REMEMBERING DONALD “DUCK” DUNN.

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JENNIFER RUBIN: 10 Things About Deb Fischer’s Win in Nebraska.

I WOULD HAVE BUILT A GIANT WOODEN BADGER, MYSELF: Greeks Apologize to Europe with Huge Horse.

MICHAEL BARONE: Rattled Obama Team Making Miscues. “As a supporter of same-sex marriage, I am glad Obama took the step that Dick Cheney took several years ago. . . . But Gallup reports that 26 percent of voters say they’re less likely to vote for him because of this issue, exactly twice the 13 percent who say they’re more likely to do so.”

WELL, AT LEAST THEY’RE CONSISTENT: Democrats On Track To Extend No-Budget Streak: “Senate Democrats are poised to continue their impressive streak of budgetary negligence on Wednesday by unanimously rejecting as many as five different budgets, including the one offered by President Obama. Republicans, meanwhile, are hoping that voters will pick up on the disturbing trend.”

SMALL BUSINESSES THRIVING thanks to Amazon customers.

Small may be the new big, but when you’re small, big entities can help. I wrote about this phenomenon years ago, and it’s still true.

INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY: Narcissism update: Obama now inserts himself into online bios of past presidents. Actually, this isn’t narcissism, exactly, but something worse. Given that Obama surely didn’t insert these changes himself, it suggests an attitude within his staff, not just a personal failing of Obama’s.

UPDATE: And the Rutherford B. Hayes meme is back!

More Hayes fun here. In retrospect, I think the Hayes blooper, and the response, was the beginning of Obama’s social-media collapse.

ANNALS OF THE ONE PERCENT: Obama Disclosures Reveal Account at JPMorgan.

President Barack Obama has a fat account at JPMorgan Chase & Co. and a mortgage on his Chicago home that he should probably refinance.

Obama’s financial disclosure forms, released today, show assets of at least $2.5 million, including a JPMorgan account worth at least $500,000. . . .

Obama’s disclosures also show he has a more than $500,000 mortgage on his Illinois home with a 5.625 percent interest rate he took out in 2005. That’s much higher than current rates, which can run below 4 percent. Ironically, Obama has pushed refinancing as a part of his Congressional “to-do list,” saying the average family would be able to save thousands of dollars a year.

That would certainly be true for Obama if he took his own advice.

No one’s ever accused Obama of being good at handling debt.

AD: A Few Of The 23 Million. “Today, in the Obama economy, twenty-three million Americans are out of work, underemployed, or have stopped looking for work. These are the stories behind the statistics. These are a few of the twenty-three million.”

IF ONLY STUDENTS GOT SCHUMPETER INSTEAD OF HOWARD ZINN: “The difficult truth that virtually no politician is prepared to acknowledge is that the road to job creation runs through job destruction.”

DEBT PROBLEMS: Boehner Questions Obama’s Courage. “The difference between knowing what’s right and doing what’s right is courage, and the president, I’m sorry to say, lost his.”

WALTER RUSSELL MEAD: Remember when Occupy Wall Street was sweeping the nation? “The media branded it the left’s answer to the Tea Party, the start of a grand national mobilization; depending on who you ask, half of America once supported the OWS protestors, double the amount who back the Tea Party. The Huffington Post even launched a separate page devoted entirely to coverage of OWS. How the mighty have fallen. . . . OWS has essentially fallen apart. It is not a significant presence on the streets; it is not a significant presence in Democratic Party politics; it is not a significant presence in the national conversation.”

OWS was never mighty. It was always a bubble full of media hot air, and it collapsed when its actual behavior damaged it to the point that even the media’s best effots couldn’t keep it inflated, at which point the press started pretending it had never existed. . . .

MY A DUE PROCESS RIGHT TO RECORD THE POLICE, coauthored with John Steakley, is still charting at #1 on SSRN. Thanks for the interest!

JAMES TARANTO: It’s Obama vs. The New York Times. “It’s not the first time the New York Times has been accused of bias, but it may be the funniest.”

Plus, why Frank Bruni is a bigot.

WILL MASSACHUSETTS DEMS dump Elizabeth Warren for Marisa DeFranco?

SWEETHEART DEAL? Senator wants answers on Google air fleet leasing at NASA field.

JOHN HINDERAKER: The High Cost Of Regulation.

Remember when President Obama said that his policies would cause the cost of electricity to skyrocket? Well, the cost has skyrocketed, but not only because of Obama. In February, Robert Bryce of the Manhattan Institute released a study of the cost of renewable energy mandates. In most states, regulatory authorities have required utilities to obtain a specified portion of their power from renewable sources–wind, solar, and so on. Those energy sources are nowhere near as efficient as coal and natural gas, which means they cost far more per kilowatt hour. But the utility has to buy that energy by law, and it passes the higher cost on to its ratepayers. Generally, the ratepayers–i.e., all of us–have no idea that they are paying extra to subsidize “green” fantasies.

There’s too much regulation, for too many lousy reasons. If regulation isn’t clearly for the common good, it’s just bossiness — a deprivation of freedom for no good reason — and should be remedied by tar, feathers, and such other means as get the message across.

EUROPE: Italy’s banks shaken as economic slump deepens. “As Greece erupts, Italy is moving into the eye of the storm. Its economy is contracting at speeds not seen since the depths of the slump in 2009 as draconian austerity bites, greatly increasing the risk of social revolt and a banking crisis.”

MORE OBAMA PRIMARY PROBLEMS? California Dems Planning to Vote For “Mickey Mouse” In June Primary. Well, he’s got the ears. Plus this:

In New Hampshire: Obama lost 20% of the primary vote; the #1 write in name was Ron Paul.

Tuesday nights election results in West Virginia has a convicted felon getting over 40% of the vote in the DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY and garnering at least a delegate. LMAO, indeed.

Over 20% of North Carolina DEMOCRATS selected “No Preference” as the Presidential nominee.

Ouch.

GEORGE ZIMMERMAN UPDATE: Broken Nose, Broken Narrative. “This doesn’t prove that George Zimmerman acted lawfully, but it breaks the narrative that Zimmerman was not injured, pushed by the Martin family attorneys, left-wing blogs, LGF, and many others with an agenda.”

Related: Autopsy Reveals Trayvon Martin Had Bloody Knuckles When He Died.

UPDATE: More from Tom Maguire.

FORGET “PEAK OIL:” Have we reached Peak Government? Well, they do seem to be running out of other people’s money. . . .

VOTER FRAUD UPDATE: New O’Keefe video exposes non-citizens on voter rolls in NC, voter fraud comfort at UNC.

OH MY: MoveOn: DNC Pulling Out of Wisconsin Recall. If this is true, it’s a major debacle for the Dems.

Related: New Daily Kos/PPP poll: Walker 50%, Barrett 45%. Obama’s chickens are coming home to roost. Everywhere at once, apparently . . .

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: These days, a law degree comes with $150,000 of debt — and no guarantee of a job after graduation. “I know that I am better off than a lot of these younger lawyers. I get job interviews. I can afford the apartment I share with my friend. I have a great resume. I am an excellent researcher and writer. I rarely go to bed hungry anymore.”

Plus: “Approximately half of the 45,000 people who will graduate this year from ABA-accredited law schools will never find jobs as lawyers. . . . All this adds up to a completely unsustainable system.” And yet most of those law schools are on campuses with sustainability centers.

If only there were something that explained this phenomenon.

UH OH: Urban Radio Callers Slam Obama Over Gay Marriage Support.

CHANGE: Yikes! Dem Presidential Candidate John Wolfe Closes in On Barack Obama in Arkansas.

DOG BITES MAN: MSNBC panel agrees media will be in the bag for Obama at the debates.