JOHN EDWARDS parties on.

A TRENT LOTT MOMENT for Kay Hagan? I don’t think she ever wished that Byrd had been elected President during his Klan days.

THE REAL HOSTAGES: General Petraeus’ hearings made Obama a political hostage to his new Afghan commander—but also greatly improved U.S. chances of winning.

THE ELITES DOUBLE DOWN: Fed Economist Attacks Uncredentialed Econo-blogging.

UPDATE: Reader Gord Richens emails: “Two of the field’s most celebrated academics, Myron Scholes and Robert Merton shared the Nobel Prize for Economics in 1997 – the year before they helped fly Long Term Capital Management into the ground.”

OKAY, I HAD THIS THE OTHER DAY, BUT IT’S WORTH REPEATING AGAIN: Dutch Oil Spill Response Ships Could Suck 99% of Oil From Gulf, But Can’t Get Approved, Because EPA Demands 99.9985% Purity. The 99% is an estimate, but the point holds.

WALTER RUSSELL MEAD: G-20 Fiddles; World Burns. “The verdict on the G-20 meeting is in. It wasn’t delivered by the spinmeisters of the global leaders hailing their bosses’ groundbreaking accomplishments. It wasn’t delivered by the clueless journalists gravely assessing whether the summit was a win for Merkel’s message of austerity or Obama’s message of spending. The verdict was delivered by the world’s financial markets and it can best be summed up by the Edvard Munch painting: ‘The Scream.'”

JAMES RUMMEL: A Blast From The Past: ‘Back in the bad old days of the Cold War, a lot of successful espionage projects run by the Soviets hinged on a certain type of snobbery. . . . I was strongly reminded of that long ago time when reading about the latest Russian spy ring that the FBI broke up recently.”

CANADIAN HEALTH CARE, IN SLATE:

Two months ago, my mother died very unexpectedly. After reviewing her medical records, my siblings and I discovered that her physician ignored test results and treated her for an illness she did not have. If she had received proper care, my mother would be alive today. This being Canada, we don’t intend to sue, although we do expect an apology from the doctor and the hospital.

Good luck with that.

DAILY KOS POLL FRAUD. Markos is suing his pollsters, who weren’t able to fake randomness.

DECRYPTING the Plato code?

JIM TREACHER: Al Gore Is Slippery: He just comes and goes as he pleases, according to KGTV in San Diego.

IOWAHAWK: I’ll Take a Cashier’s Check, Mr. Breitbart. Heh. It’s just what you expected . . . .

FASTER PLEASE: No more fillings? Gel regenerates teeth.

A BUDDING KAGAN SCANDAL? It’s pretty clearly an ACOG scandal, at least.

UPDATE: Reader Aric Giddens emails: “I am an Ob/Gyn and while I am pro-choice, I do respect the position of those who are against abortion. I said at the time, however, that the ACOG statement was not true and and no basis in medical fact. It was clearly a political statement. A so called ‘partial-birth abortion’ is almost never performed and doesn’t have to be to save the life of or protect the life of the mother. I thought President Clinton was pandering to his base to opposed such a ban. I have never seen a medical need for such a procedure in 20 years in my field. Such a ban would not have endanger any woman’s life or health. While I am opposed to the government dictating what medical procedure may or may not be performed, there was not science behind the ACOG statement.”

ILYA SOMIN responds to Justice Breyer’s consequentialism.

This argument ignores social science evidence suggesting that extreme gun bans like those of DC and Chicago cost at least as many innocent lives than they save. Still, gun rights probably do cause at least some deaths that might otherwise have been prevented.

In that respect, however, they are no different from numerous other constitutional rights. Justice Breyer’s argument in McDonald is actually very similar to Justice Antonin Scalia’s dissent in Boumediene v. Bush, where Scalia warned that giving habeas corpus rights to War on Terror detainees “will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed.” That argument didn’t move Breyer, who voted with the majority to extend those rights.

Read the whole thing.

IS TV TEACHING US TO OVERREACT? I’m quoted in the piece, but in a passage not quoted, I suggested that it may make people more passive when they’re not in front of the TV, by getting them used to a higher level of stimulus to provoke a reaction. Kind of like how porn and violence have been good for America’s children. . . .

MARKDOWNS ON classic movies and TV shows. Even I Dream of Jeannie. Larry Hagman’s best work!

POLL: Most Germans Want To Ditch The Euro.

ED DRISCOLL: Oceania Has Never Been At War With General Petraeus.

UPDATE: A reader emails: “Regarding the Oceania/Petraeus thing, it occurs to me that BP is the administration’s Emmanuel Goldstein.” Well, one of many.

WELL, THIS WON’T HELP SPACE TOURISM: International Space Station sex ban: Commanders do not allow sexual intercourse on the International Space Station, it has been disclosed. On the other hand, this provides a market niche for the private sector!

VICTOR DAVIS HANSON: Where Did The Tea Party Anger Come From? “In short, sometime in the last ten years public employees were directly identified with most of what is now unsustainable in the U.S. The old idea that a public servant gave up a competitive salary for job security was redefined as hitting the jackpot. . . . Emblematic of the anger at both top and bottom was the 2008 meltdown: those who had not played by the rules still got their mortgages, then defaulted, and left the taxpayer with their bills; those who made the loans and profited without risk, took the bailout money, and left us with the cleanup. Those in between with underwater mortgages and higher taxes pay the tab.”

REPORT: Lowering homocysteine levels does not reduce heart attack risk.

FASTER, PLEASE: 5 Ways Body Scanners Could Make Fitting Rooms Obsolete.

WELL, THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY, AFTER ALL: MIT, Harvard Researchers Create “Smart Sheets” That Can Self-Assemble Into Airplanes, Boats.

FROM JONATHAN ADLER, ET AL., reactions to the Kagan hearings.