FROM “GOING ROGUE” TO “GOING ROGAINE.”

U.N. CLIMATE CHIEF: ClimateGate emails are damaging our credibility.

A FOOLISH CONSISTENCY is the hobgoblin of little minds.

A SALE ON cookware and housewares.

JOURNALISM: CNN’s Kurtz: ‘Stunning Lapse in Judgment’ for CNN to Ignore Baucus Scandal, CBS’s Reid Sees ‘No Scandal’. No, it’s no scandal at all when a Senator nominates the unqualified mistress with whom he is having an extramarital affair to be United States attorney. Nothing to see here. Move along.

ROBERT FRANK WANTS YOU IN PRISON for daring to criticize.

SHUT UP, THEY EXPLAINED: North Dakota Democrats Want To Punish Insurance Company For Speaking Out Against Obamacare. This seems to be a consistent theme . . . .

CLARK HOYT DROPS THE BALL AGAIN, gets spanked by Ann Althouse.

SOME TV and video markdowns.

LIFE EXTENSION AND DIET: “A new study in fruit flies suggests that the life-extending properties of caloric restriction may be due not only to fewer calories in the diet, but also to just the right mix of protein building blocks, called amino acids. The study, published online December 2 in Nature, may help explain some of the health benefits of restricted-calorie diets. Coupled with other data, the new study should prompt researchers to reevaluate whether it is calorie count or the nutrient composition of a diet that is most important for regulating lifespan and health, comments Luigi Fontana of Washington University in St. Louis.”

I hope they figure this out soon. Faster, please!

J.D. JOHANNES: “I just returned from Iraq and people have started asking me what I think of the Afghan Surge. (I spent some time in Afghanistan this Summer.) The Afghan Surge can work if Battalion Commanders on the ground fight the war correctly and if it lasts longer than one troop rotation. As of this morning I am lacking in confidence on both counts.”

UPDATE: Related thoughts. “President Obama is in pretty much the same position as President Nixon found himself in 1969 and 1970. If he continues to fight in Afghanistan, he really can’t allow the enemy to have a safe haven in Pakistan.” It’s certainly true that Pakistan is the real problem here. If Pakistan were in good order, Afghanistan would be much easier; without fixing Pakistan, it’s much harder. But Pakistan is very hard to fix.

Of course, Barack Obama has been talking about sending troops into Pakistan for a long time: “Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential candidate, has said that he would send troops into Pakistan to hunt down terrorists, a week after chief rival Hillary Clinton described his foreign policy skills as naive. The senator warned Pakistani President Gen Pervez Musharraf that, under an Obama presidency, he would have to do more to shut down terrorist operations in his country and evict foreign fighters or risk a US troop invasion and losing hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid.”

THE HILL: Obama Meets Dems Without Addressing Divisive Issues.

UPDATE: Reader C.J. Burch writes: “I wonder if the Senators realize they got peed on.” You mean that wasn’t rain?

IT IS SO A PLANET! Alan Boyle has a new book out called The Case for Pluto: How a Little Planet Made a Big Difference. Dale Amon has a report from the book release party.

THE AGE OF STUPID.

UPDATE: Jonathan Gewirtz writes: “Since the train didn’t explode it must not have been a critical mass of stupidity, but if two such trains collided…” Best not even to imagine such things.

DAN RIEHL: What Is ACORN Up To In Ohio?

SALENA ZITO: What Today’s Democrats Don’t Get:

Franklin D. Roosevelt understood what it meant to be a core Democrat and to maintain his party’s ranks.

He built winning coalitions around his policies by empowering previously suppressed groups, such as labor unions and urban ethnics. In the process, he created a 40-year dynasty for Democrats.

Today’s bunch? Not so much.

The problem for FDR’s party is that it hasn’t adapted swiftly enough to two realities — that jobs are the most important issue to the nation, and that the middle class (which Democrats claim to champion) is dissolving under its watch.

Read the whole thing.

OOPS: WaPo: White House forgot that they told McChrystal to defeat the Taliban. “They told him — in his official orders — to come up with a plan to eliminate the enemy and, dummy that he is, he thought that meant he was supposed to come up with a plan to eliminate the enemy. Then they told him he didn’t have to. Six months later. . . . So it goes for our supposedly Spock-like president, who made such a pageant during the the past three months of deliberating over Afghanistan lest he waste time and lives by rashly adopting the wrong strategy.”

CHARLIE MARTIN: Fast Facts About ClimateGate.

POLLING: Obama Approval Goes Underwater On Pollster.com Average.

WASHINGTON POST: Obama The Mortal. “Some parishioners in the Church of Obama discovered last week that their spiritual leader is a false prophet.” And that they were the rubes . . . .

ANNE APPLEBAUM unhurt after car blast. Given police guard.

SCIENTISTS behaving badly.

THE BIG CUTOFF: Climate Scientist to Revkin: “we can no longer trust you” to carry water for us.

Related: “It’s how they build consensus.”

UPDATE: A breach in the “bunker.”

OUCH: Gordon Brown snubbed by soldiers’ ‘curtain’ protest. “Gordon Brown was snubbed by badly injured Afghan veterans when they closed curtains round their beds during a hospital visit and refused to speak to him. More than half the soldiers being treated at the Selly Oak hospital ward in Birmingham either asked for the curtains to be closed or deliberately avoided the prime minister, according to several of those present. . . . Furious about equipment shortages and poor compensation for their injuries, one soldier said:’It is almost as if we are the product of an unwanted affair … he has done nothing for us.’” New Labour expects sacrifice but returns no loyalty. This is the result, and they’ll be lucky if it stops here.

MELISSA CLOUTHIER is not happy about the male-cleavage fashion trend. “I have some news for Mr. Bastian: The ’70s were hideous. There were man perms. Remember the powder blue tux with ruffles? How about the wide lapels and the fat ties that fought them? This was the decade of Elvis Presley’s lamb-chop sideburns. And even now, ‘pornstaches’ (as in mustaches gracing ’70s-era porn stars) are scorned.”

PATIENCE: Line forms in front of Sioux Falls Barnes & Noble 36 Hours Before Palin Visit. Good grief.

MARC SHEPARD: Understanding ClimateGate’s Hidden Decline.

GOOD NEWS: Virgin Galactic Poised to Unveil Suborbital Spaceliner. (Via Samizdata).

REMEMBERING THE CREATION OF HOTWIRED, and the first banner ad.

HOT AIR AND CARBON: Copenhagen climate summit: 1,200 limos, 140 private planes and caviar wedges.

I’ll believe it’s a crisis when the people who tell me it’s a crisis start acting like it’s a crisis.

MORE PROGRESS FOR THE Tennessee Newspaper Network.

IN THE MAIL: Who Turned Out the Lights?: Your Guided Tour to the Energy Crisis.

ARE YOU UNEMPLOYED?

TAXPROF: 1/3 of Tax Returns Filed Pay Zero Tax (and 1/2 of Those Get “Refunds”).

VICTOR DAVIS HANSON: Our Present Anxieties.

CANADIAN HYSTERIA: A SWAT Raid Over A LEGO Gun.

HAMMER, MEET ANVIL: “It’s 3/4 Marines* and 3rd Recon, working on both ends of Helmand’s Now Zad valley with a Taliban concentration, communication and supply lines in the middle.”

FOLLOWUP: So in yesterday’s discussion of hands-on toys, numerous readers thought my five-year-old nephew could probably handle the Snap Circuits Electronics Kit even though it says it’s for 8 and up. I asked my brother about it — and he reported that they gave him that very kit for his birthday last month and he’s using it with glee, and even improving some of the designs that come with it.

Okay. So now I’m thinking the Snap Circuits radio-controlled rover. Or maybe I should just send him off to help debug the Large Hadron Collider . . . .

UPDATE: Reader Jeff Weimer writes:

We bought the Snap-Circuits kit last Christmas for my then 6 year old son, who immediately began to build the most complicated diagram – the AM radio on the cover. He only got one thing wrong – a diode backwards. We later bought the rover and an expansion kit. It’s a great tool for teaching electronics hands on. And the helicopter fan will go up at least 20 feet if you wire the motor in series with both battery packs. And some of it is surprisingly easy to repair; if you know how to solder, you can fix the wire connectors lickety split.

That was when we thought maybe he was too smart for his age and we needed to look at skipping the second grade or gifted programs. He’s now beating his fellow third graders in school, mostly. He still complains that school is too easy.

Full disclosure – I’m an electronics and weapons system tech in the Navy, so I’m intimately familiar with the concepts and items in the kits. It lets me teach a little bit to my son what I do on an everyday basis.

Well, my nephew’s mom is getting her Ph.D in AI, and my brother’s become — under my evil influence — an electronics geek, so I guess this all makes sense. I’m sending him the rover this year.

CLIMATEGATE: Obama’s Science Adviser Confirms the Scandal — Unintentionally.

A REPORT, WITH PHOTOS AND VIDEO, from yesterday’s anti-KSM trial rally in New York.

UPDATE: The weather was better at this Orange County anti-Pelosi protest.

DAVID BELLAMY: Twenty-Eight Years on TV, Then Blackballed for Challenging AGW. “An illustrious career on the BBC and ITV was cut short when Professor Bellamy came out as a global warming heretic.”

MICHAEL SILENCE: Is this a news story or an editorial?

“This AP report should at least be labeled analysis. And not one mention of Climategate.”

DVDS AS LOW AS $5.49.

STEPHEN GREEN: THE WEEK IN BLOGS!

TINA BROWN: What Is Obama Talking About?

Plus, Lee Siegel: All Things To All People. “We can win the war, but be home in 18 months. We can have health-care reform, without increasing the deficit. . . . Obama’s language is the temperamental equivalent of Tiger Woods’ libido. Both the president’s rhetoric and the golfer’s id want everything.” We could use a lot more superego in Washington. . . .

BITES FROM THE APPLE: A roundup of news from the Apple Empire.

FOCUS GROUP: Congress Is Like Satan. Best bit: “One telling moment came after Hart asked each voter to write the name that comes to mind when they think of Congress. Bill, a 62-year-old retired automobile-industry executive and independent who backed Obama, wrote ‘Satan.’ When Hart asked why, Bill answered, ‘Because I wasn’t sure of the correct spelling of ‘Beelzebub.’ Now that’s intensity.”

A.W.R. HAWKINS: Al Gore: Fraud, Scaredy Cat. “Gore backs out of his planned hand-shaking appearance in Copenhagen. Perhaps because anyone allowed to get that close might be able to ask a question.” He knows it’s all unravelling.

THE COUNTRY, AND AUTO INDUSTRY, ARE IN THE VERY BEST OF HANDS: “The first morning of this year’s Los Angeles auto show, the CEO of General Motors, Fritz Henderson, was scheduled to give the keynote address. The night before, he got fired.”

A REPORT, WITH PHOTOS, from the KSM trial protest in Manhattan.

GOOD QUESTION: “So how do we know there haven’t been other gate-crashers?’

PJTV WILL HAVE CREWS IN COPENHAGEN covering the “climate change” conference.

SCIENTISTS BEHAVING BADLY: Steve Hayward on the ClimateGate scandal. “The behavior of the CRU circle has cast a long shadow over the entire climate science community, and many honest scientists will now undeservedly bear the stigma of Climategate unless a full airing of the issues is conducted. Other important climate research centers with close ties to the CRU–including NASA’s Goddard Institute and the Climate Change Science Program at NOAA–should not be exempt from a full-dress investigation. Such a reevaluation must begin with an understanding of the crucial role the CRU circle has played in the global warming drama.” Read the whole thing, which provides a nice summary of the issues so far.

A ROUNDUP ON THE Max Baucus sex-and-appointments scandal.

UPDATE: There’s a Max Baucus joke contest. Don’t bother trying anything involving “the pubic option.”

CANADIAN POLITICIANS TALK GENDER EQUALITY but fold like a cheap suit where the Olympics are concerned.

CHENEY’S REVENGE: Pew poll: Public support for torture at five-year high. “In case you’re wondering who won the de facto debate between Obama and Cheney earlier this year, wonder no more.” Andrew Sullivan weeps. Though, frankly, I think his self-glorifying use of the issue has done more harm than good.

SCOTT ROSENBERG looks back at paywalls. “Paywalls are psychological as much as navigational, and it’s a lot easier to put them up than to take them down. Once web users get it in their head that your site is ‘closed’ to them, if you ever change your mind and want them to come back, it’s extremely difficult to get that word out.”

VIRGINIA POSTREL ON GIFT-GIVING AND THE KNOWLEDGE PROBLEM: “The problem of buying good presents for other people, even people you supposedly know well, illustrates that old familiar Hayekian concept, the knowledge problem. If you can’t even give your loved ones the right presents, how likely is it that a central authority could make the right decisions for everyone?”

ENVIRONMENTALISTS ATTACK PROSTITUTES, prostitutes fight back. “Møller adds that it is reprehensible and unfair that Copenhagen politicians have chosen to use the UN Climate Summit as a platform for a hetz against sex workers. ‘But they’ve done it and we have to defend ourselves,’ Møller says.” You go, girl.

NEW THOUGHTS ABOUT nuclear power. Faster, please.

IN THE MAIL: From John Brown, Servant of a Dark God. Nicely blurbed by David Drake and L.E. Modesitt, Jr.

CLIMATEGATE UPDATE: British Meteorological Office to Re-Examine 160 Years Of Climate Data. “The Met Office plans to re-examine 160 years of temperature data after admitting that public confidence in the science on man-made global warming has been shattered by leaked e-mails. The new analysis of the data will take three years, meaning that the Met Office will not be able to state with absolute confidence the extent of the warming trend until the end of 2012.” (Via SonicFrog).

ROB PORTMAN CALLS FOR PAYROLL TAX HOLIDAY. Nonstarter. No opportunity for graft.

SOME RECOMMENDED TOYS FOR BOYS.

I can’t wait until my nephew is old enough for the Snap Circuits electronics kit. I’m guessing next year. . . .

Plus, there’s always The Dangerous Book For Boys. Okay, it’s not technically a “toy,” but . . . .

UPDATE: Reader John Henry emails: “My grandaughter was almost 5 last Christmas and I bought her one. Partly as an excuse to play with it myself. She loved it. She could even figure out some of the simpler things by herself once I had shown here. Bottom line, don’t wait to buy one for your nephew. Do it now.” Hmm. Okay. He’s awfully smart for 5, so it might work out.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Looking good — reader James Doherty writes: “I got that for my son when he was 4. At that age, he needed help with the instructions, but he snapped the parts together himself. Much like legos, but with switches, lights and noises. Extremely cool.”

MORE: Further suggestions here.

THE ’70S REALLY ARE BACK: The return of man-cleavage.

CAN THE GOVERNMENT DO ANYTHING RIGHT? A state-run monopoly on an industry that basically takes people’s money, and yet: NYC’s Off-Track-Betting Seeks Bankruptcy Protection.

OWEN FISS: Obama’s Guantanamo Betrayal.

UPDATE: Col. Douglas Mortimer isn’t impressed with Fiss:

“But the sad fact is that Obama has not carried through on this promise and now presides over the very horror he himself had the courage to denounce.”

Courage, my ass. I can’t remember who it was, but some guy somewhere said something about how the Left’s pre-November 2008 loud and constant denunciation of Gitmo looks more and more like it was intended to do nothing more than bamboozle the rubes.

Yeah, I think I heard that someplace too. . . .

SHOULD AL GORE’S OSCAR BE RESCINDED? And other questions in this PJTV climate change survey.

FROM THE FOLKS AT NBC: A “payday loan” scam for freelancers.

If a non-media company were doing this, there’d be a Dateline story about evil corporations abusing their employees . . . .

CLIMATEGATE IN THE WASHINGTON POST: In e-mails, science of warming is hot debate. “In an effort to control what the public hears, did prominent scientists who link climate change to human behavior try to squelch a back-and-forth that is central to the scientific method? Is the science of global warming messier than they have admitted?”

NEW HEALTH CARE COST-CONTAINMENT HEROINES! More women choose do-it-yourself births. Soon: Articles on the hip new trend of DIY brain surgery!

WHAT SAN FRANCISCO REALLY NEEDS: Public sex tents.

UTAH TEA PARTY ORGANIZER DAVID KIRKHAM WRITES:

These 4 pictures should strike more fear into the heart of a politician than any rockous town hall meeting, call, letter, or Tea Party. 24 hours ago we put out the word we needed 13 volunteers to be “Legislative Captains,” (one for each of the 13 state legislators we have here in Utah county). The Legislative Captains would work in their respective legislative districts to recruit delegates for the convention. We sent about 50 very targeted invites to people based on their address. We gathered the names from our Tea Party sign up sheets. 20 people showed up. So, with the extra people, we asked what expertise everyone had. We then divided up duties on Facebook, events, marketing, and a new website, www.utah912teaparty.com. On the whiteboard “POP” stands for Precinct Operation Program. Just say NO to RINOS.

Here’s one of the pics. Cool setting!

UPDATE: A reader emails: “I like it: Garage-band politics.” Heh. But that’s no ordinary garage.

AN EARLY SNOWFALL here in Knoxville.

SO DOES THIS MEAN I SHOULD CHANGE MY LAST NAME to “Beck?”

UPDATE: A reader suggests keeping the last name, but changing my initials to “R.J.” I’d happily swap bank accounts either way . . . .

LOTS MORE CLIMATEGATE COVERAGE at Andrew Bolt’s place.

SHOCKINGLY, ROBERT GIBBS’ PERSONAL CHARM is beginning to lose its luster.

AT AMAZON, it’s the Friday Sale.

MEGAN MCARDLE: Cautiously optimistic on today’s employment data. Well, so was I until I discovered that they were compiled by the University of East Anglia . . .

On a more serious note, the latest chart of promises vs. results.

A THOROUGHLY MODERN moral dilemma.

IF YOU ATTEND THAT protest against the KSM trial in Foley Square tomorrow, send me a report and pics.

GATEWAY PUNDIT under cyber-attack.

UPDATE: Betsy Gorisch writes: “Soon it’ll be formalized, and from the government.”

To paraphrase Monsieur Rick, there are certain sections of the blogosphere that I do not recommend you invade.

PICS AND VIDEO from that Orange County Pelosi protest.

OKAY, FIRST CLOSING THE OZONE HOLE WARMED THE ANTARCTIC, NOW THIS: Obesity May Wipe Out Benefit of Anti-Smoking Effort, Study Says.

ROLL CALL: Breaking News: Baucus Nominated Girlfriend for U.S. Attorney. “Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus’ office confirmed late Friday night that the Montana Democrat was carrying on an extramarital affair with his state office director, Melodee Hanes, when he nominated her to be U.S. attorney in Montana. According to a source familiar with their relationship, Hanes and Baucus began their relationship in the summer of 2008 – nearly a year before Baucus and his wife, Wanda, formally separated in April. The Senator has since divorced his wife.” At least the former Mrs. Baucus didn’t attack him with a golf club.

UPDATE: Reader Clifford Grout writes: “Maybe she should hit him with a draft of his health care bill. Bet that would hurt.” It’s heavier than a golf club, for sure.

IT’S FRIDAY: Bank failure tally reaches 130: Regulators shutter Cleveland-based AmTrust Bank, and five other banks. Closures will cost the FDIC $2.384 billion.

UPDATE: Zero Hedge has more.

KNIFEBLOGGING: Pugs Of War notes: “Just a note for the day – Amazon is offering a Shun Ken Onion 3-Piece knife set which is nominally a $595 set for $200 today. These are truly awesome knives and though I can’t justify the purchase of any more kitchen cutlery, my cooking eye is twitching as I look at these beauties.” They’re kinda pricey to me, too, but lots of people like ‘em.

Plus, noble uses for buttermilk.

UPDATE: Reader Chuck Herrick reports that they’ve gone up. He’s right! Stupid dynamic pricing. . . .

WHICH IS WORSE? Rape or cuckoldry?

IN ORANGE COUNTY, protesting Nancy Pelosi.

SAY YES TO THE DRESS: If that show were aimed at men, there would be more wedding dresses like this.

WHAT COULD GO WRONG? Obama Changes Copenhagen Plans At Last Minute. “Obama appears to be betting that his presence can – as he has expressed hope for several times in the past – push the negotiations ‘over the top’ toward an agreement.”

PHOTOGRAPHER ARRESTED, SUES FOR $3 MILLION. “While driving on Paseo De Oro Road in Tamuning Oct. 4, Adkins came across a truck crash, and stopped to take photos with his cell phone, according to the complaint. He was stopped by a police officer, who allegedly told Adkins he couldn’t take pictures of the crash and demanded Adkins’ cell phone. After Adkins refused, a second police officer allegedly demanded Adkins’ cell phone, and told him to get out of his car, the complaint states.”

HIDING THE DECLINE management.

GOING ON “Washington detox.” Me, I moved to Tennessee. But my case wasn’t nearly as severe . . . .

UPDATE: Thoughts from Aleta Jackson.

DAVID HARSANYI: We-don’t-want-to-talk-about-it-gate.

WELL, THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY: Gull-Wing Firefighting ATV Could Operate in the Middle of Inferno. So, really, it should fly, too.

MORE Judicial Corruption In South-East Pennsylvania.

UPDATE: Adam Bonin writes that this is actually northeast Pennsylvania, not southeast.

A RECIPE FOR Christmas Cookies.

ANDREW KLAVAN: That’s not cancer on your X-Ray — it’s a “happy spot!”

A COMMUNITY REINVESTMENT ACT for “news” organizations?