HEH: “The airlines, not exactly flush with capital at the moment, can’t be happy. At least the VPOTUS can take comfort in the fact that this will quickly be forgotten, as compared to, say, if Dan Quayle had made the same statement under the same conditions.”

Plus this: “Joseph Biden is frankly a comic character and we are lucky to have him. Things are just too grim these days – what with the putative swine flu catastrophe, the economic decline and Islamopsychos on the rise in Iraq again. We need a little Biden in our life.”

Also, “Tapper to Gibbs: Can you clarify Biden’s moronic comment about subways?” “This makes twice now in four days that Team Barry has panicked New York City while providing rich fodder for gallows humor. What do they have planned for the weekend?” Something . . . wonderful!

COMPARING ISRAELIS TO NAZIS.

HMM: FBI Looks Into Losses at Freddie. “Federal investigators looking into possible accounting violations at Freddie Mac are raising questions about whether the giant government-backed mortgage company improperly delayed the recognition of billions of dollars of losses, according to people familiar with the matter.”

COMPARING Bush’s polls to Obama’s.

MICKEY KAUS: Scariest Thing I’ve Heard About Obama. “He reads Andrew Sullivan’s blog. … The Churchill/torture anecdote Obama told last night (from ‘an article I was reading’) apparently came from Sullivan. Not surprisingly, the ‘facts had altered slightly’ by the time they’d made their way through Andrew to Obama.” I can see why Obama prefers Sullivan. But he’d help himself more by reading InstaPundit. No “bubble” here.

UPDATE: Related item here.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Kathleen St. Onge writes: “Obama reads Andrew Sullivan? Isn’t that kind of like Zac Efron reading Tiger Beat?” Heh.

SO WHAT’S WRONG WITH a bearskin rug?

HOPE AND CHANGE: Consumer spending dips in March as recession persists; jobless claims stuck at elevated levels. “Consumer spending fell more than expected in March after two straight monthly gains, a stark reminder of a fragile economy that has pushed a record number of Americans to draw jobless benefits.”

NPR: Justice Souter to retire.

UPDATE: Interesting angle here. Specter’s defection bad for the Dems?

OBAMA VS. FOX: Ratings war.

THE TERRORIST THREAT from within our own borders.

MEGAN MCARDLE: Obama needs to ask the public to make sacrifices. Hey, didn’t they say that about Bush?

TEXAS: It’s like a whole other country. Even to the State Department!

POCKET-SIZED HD CAMCORDERS. Plus, get 720p for $140. The more these things proliferate, the better it is for blogospheric newsgathering.

I’M AT THE FABULOUS BAKER CENTER on the University of Tennessee campus, where we’re talking about journalistic ethics and the Internet. That’s Jack McElroy of the News-Sentinel and Richard Griffiths of CNN in the foreground. The panel starts in a minute.

ELECTRICITY FROM THE DEEP: A look at Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion.

VOTING RIGHTS, and “unusually labored breeziness.”

TEXTS FROM LAST NIGHT.

NINTH CIRCUIT SECOND AMENDMENT RULING: Not newsworthy?

JOE TRIPPI: John Edwards shouldn’t have run.

WINE ADDS YEARS TO YOUR LIFE: And life to your years! Not sure about the dosages here, though.