THE NEW CIVILITY IN NEW JERSEY: “I want to punch him in his head.” You’ll just break a knuckle, dude. But maybe he’s responding to suggestions from Wisconsin Democrats.

JAMES JOYNER: “Leon Panetta has been brought in to oversee significant cuts to the U.S. Defense budget. Meanwhile, we’re in six wars. . . . But it’s shocking that we’re in half a dozen kinetic military operations and your average American would be doing well to name three. Something’s not quite democratic about that.”

TOBY HARNDEN: Down On The Fourth of July: The United States Of Gloom. “The last comparable Fourth of July was probably in 1980, when there was a recession, skyrocketing petrol prices and an Iranian hostage crisis, with 53 Americans being held in Tehran. . . . Obama’s promise of a national transformation after the Bush years, moreover, means that the thud of coming back down to earth has been that much harder.”

So much for all the hope-and-change talk.

AT AMAZON, markdowns in Home & Garden.

WISCONSIN DEMOCRATS: Spokesman Calls For Violence Against Republicans.

ROGER KIMBALL: Annie Sprinkle Does The Times.

STACY MCCAIN BOASTS: “Satan Reads This Blog.” Well, a rather minor imp, at best.

A TALE OF Two Shutdowns. “Minnesota’s government shutdown has made national news, in part because it foreshadows, in some respects, the battle that will play out in Washington over the next month on the debt ceiling. What has happened in Minnesota is clearcut: our Republican legislature passed a budget for the next two years, consisting of nine spending bills. Our Democratic governor, Mark Dayton, didn’t think the legislature spent enough money, so he vetoed them. As a result of Dayton’s vetoes, state agencies ran out of funding as of July 1 and, with the exception of certain critical functions, the state’s government shut down. . . . This is not the first time Minnesota has experienced a government shutdown. In 2005, during Tim Pawlenty’s first term as governor, there was a partial shutdown that lasted for nine days. It is instructive to compare the events that led to the shutdowns of 2005 and 2011.”

JEFF DUNETZ on Eric Boehlert and Jew-Bashing.

SUSANNAH BRESLIN: How To Be An Award-Winning Blogger.

STEVE CHAPMAN: “After repeatedly saying President Obama had taken over during a recession and made it worse, Mitt Romney now denies making that statement, which makes him look silly. He’d have been better off sticking to his original claim — which by one important measure is actually true. Under Obama, the economy has stopped contracting and resumed growing. So the recession is officially over. But most people judge the economy by how many people are working. And that number is pitifully low — far lower than when Obama took office.”

A REVIEW OF THE HP TOUCHPAD TABLET. “With its stellar software hobbled by bugs and appealing hardware dogged by bloat, the TouchPad poses the question: What’s it worth to be second place to the iPad?” I saw on Facebook that Dana Loesch was excited by the TouchPad until she actually tried one. Then, kind of disappointed. Bummer.

PERHAPS NANNY BLOOMBERG SHOULD TURN HIS ATTENTION FROM TRANS-FATS FOR A MOMENT AND DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS: Chaos on Christopher: Iconic Village stretch overrun by drug dealers, prostitutes, violent youths. “I’ve never seen it like this. Fifteen years ago, you could walk down the street and you wouldn’t have to worry about getting mugged on your way home.”

Meh, who am I kidding? He can’t even deal with the bedbug problem.

THE MASSACHUSETTS WAY: “Just because you flunk the bar exam seven times doesn’t mean you can’t become a judge. At least not in Massachusetts, and not if one of your brothers is already a (Jane Swift-appointed) judge and another one is a big-time lobbyist who donated more than $100,000 to Beacon Hill pols. It also doesn’t hurt if you were hired into the hackerama by none other than Jailbird Jackie Bulger, Whitey’s ex-con brother.”

GEORGE LUCAS VS. GREENPEACE: “Obviously, George Lucas’s concern about protecting his copyright overrides his concern about offending treehuggers. Is he just being a big Jabba? Is this yet another sign that the global-warming fad is over? Both?”

SOME ADVICE TO BLOGGERS.

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR JOHN MCCAIN, we’d see an environmental nightmare, with oil spills from the Gulf of Mexico all the way to . . . Montana? I scoffed at such fear-mongering, but once again, they were right! “An undetermined amount of crude oil spilled from an ExxonMobil pipeline into the Yellowstone River in Montana, prompting evacuations of nearby residents on Saturday, authorities said.”

HMM: Big Banks Easing Terms on Loans Deemed as Risks. “Two of the nation’s biggest lenders, JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, are quietly modifying loans for tens of thousands of borrowers who have not asked for help but whom the banks deem to be at special risk.”

MARKDOWNS IN Home Audio And Video.

PROF. JACOBSON: “The New York Times and New York Magazine have the long knives out for Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance, Jr. But tell me, what precisely is it the DA’s office did wrong in the Strauss-Kahn case?”

My question: Shouldn’t we know the accuser’s name now?

IS OPEC HEADED FOR COLLAPSE?

MICHELE BACHMANN PRAISES ONE-YEAR INCOME TAX MORATORIUM. Okay, she’s the one with the LLM in Tax, not me, but this seems like a bad idea.

The weakness of our stumblebum “recovery” is largely based on regime uncertainty, not a lack of liquidity. Yeah, a year of no income tax would gin up spending, but only temporarily. If I were a business, I’d feel safer with a long-term ceiling on tax rates — and, better still, a moratorium on new regulations — than a one-year tax suspension. To me this just seems like “cash for clunkers” writ large.

The one argument I can see is that if Americans get used to a year without paying income tax, they’ll be much, much more resistant to tax increases in the future. I remember Harry Browne telling people to imagine how they could save for retirement, educate their children, etc. if they didn’t have to pay federal income tax. With this approach, people wouldn’t have to imagine. But if that’s Bachmann’s intent, I haven’t heard that.

Meanwhile, a commenter at the link (who claims to be a “tax guy”) thinks there would be no revenues if we had a moratorium on the income tax, but in fact I think it’s only about a third of federal revenue. Could we cut the budget by a third? Undoubtedly. Is there the political will to do so? Not now, but maybe if people got used to not paying. . . .

Still, I think this is a bad idea and my speculation about political effects is just after-the-fact cogitation, with no evidence that this is what Bachmann intends.

UPDATE: According to this it’s more like 45%. Still, not the only source or even the majority source of revenue, though it is the largest.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Fran Akridge writes:

First, I think Bachmann is saying some things that will keep her from being taken seriously among old-line Republicans. I am a Libertarian Republican but I can add and subtract and even multiply and divide.

However, someone (Goldwater?) used to suggest doing away with withholding so that we would “feel” exactly how much we are paying.

I do (and you may) remember the horror of paying both sides of Social Security when I was doing almost full-time consulting work.

And I remember the horror of small business people paying both sides of Social Security when I did taxes one year – many had lost withholding jobs and were doing anything to feed their families – they had figured they would owe no income tax and had forgotten about both sides of Social Security.

Ouch.

WHY IS EUROPEAN BROADBAND FASTER AND CHEAPER? More competition. Could we get some of that here, please?

AN UPSIDE OF THE DOWNSIDE: “Housing is more affordable than it’s been in a generation!”

ECHOES: Should We Blame Grandpa For Teen Joblessness? “As this graphic shows, the labor-force participation rate for those 65 and older has nearly doubled since reaching a low of about 10 percent in the mid-1980s. It peaked earlier this year at 18 percent. The last time senior participation rates were this high was in the late 1960s.”

I suspect that more older people are working because they have to in light of lousy-to-nonexistent returns on CDs and bonds — something that would be producing a lot of tear-jerker media coverage if we had a Republican president, but that goes largely unmentioned under Obama. If CDs were returning 5%, a lot more of them would be staying home. But if I were an employer looking for part-time workers, if I had the choice of a 68-year-old with extensive work history who needed the money to live, and a 17-year-old with none who was working for “extra” money, I’d pick the 68-year-old every time.

UPDATE: Reader Jeff Brown writes: “Don’t forget, a 68-yr old who by law cannot become an Obamacare burden to the business. Look at the jobless recovery among those over 45 that flips once the magical 65 is achieved.” Hmm.

ANOTHER UPDATE: A reader emails:

As a business owner, I maintain a policy of hiring grandpa over teeney, twenty, and definitely 30-ish. For our Nanny State (thank you Mayor Bloomberg, etc.), and although there is an ocean between abuse and discipline, somehow all these kids who were never told “no,” had their butts swatted, or received any harsher punishement than having their iphones removed, cannot show up on time, take direction, t-h-i-n-k (duh) or process through random challenges. There seems to be this prevailing concept that they granted me the privilege of paying them, wee socialists. Gone are the 80′s wiz kids. And, therefore today’s 20-year-olds also from working in my business. That leaves 30-year-olds with a sense of entitlement and kids of their own. Fat chance: Those are the ones who act pious for being stupid, irresponsible, not showing up (my child (who is 14) needed a ride to play practice) or otherwise not doing their job (“I am on the phone. Now, Brenda, Mommy is sorry School wasn’t fun today…”). I never hire illegals. So, if that means sending a recruiter to a nursing home, so be it. Business is business.

Well, given that old folks can’t afford to retire nowadays, at least they have that work ethic to fall back on.

MEDIA IN THE 21ST CENTURY: You Are More Likely to Survive a Plane Crash than Click a Banner Ad.

YOUNG PEOPLE ARE FAILING CIVICS, and it’s a crisis for the nation.

IN THE MAIL: Spinning the Law: Trying Cases in the Court of Public Opinion.

THREE THINGS YOU CAN DO FOR LIBERTY: My Sunday Washington Examiner column is up!

UPDATE: Related thoughts here.

ANN ALTHOUSE: “It would be great for the Wisconsin Supreme Court to figure out a way to look like… a court.” It would certainly be a change!

UPDATE: In the comments, a discussion of Shirley Abrahamson’s “Grandma Game.” Seems to be slipping.

ALEX NUNEZ: “Fortune joined this weekend’s parade of all things USA with its list of ’100 great things about America.’ Be forewarned: the list itself is exceedingly dopey. After all, Clif bars, 60 Minutes, GEICO commercials, and LeBron James are among the things that Fortune somehow manages to rank ahead of the men and women collectively serving in our armed forces.”

FOR FOURTH OF JULY WEEKEND, let me plug these thoughts on constitutional reform one more time.

BURNING DOWN THE HOUSE: George Will on Reckless Endangerment.

MICHAEL BARONE: Replacing Property As A Source Of Wealth Creation.

LUCY STEIGERWALD: Pyongyang Students Probably Weren’t Learning Anything Anyway. Students are being sent into the fields for manual labor. Why? This masterstroke:

Last week someone put a piece of graffito on the wall of a Pyongyang College which called the Dear Leader “a dictator who starved people to death.”

For North Korea, this is more or less the equivalent of setting the White House on fire with a Molotov. Pyongyang was locked down (more than usual) for three days in a vain search for the culprit. Hopefully he or she is well-hidden, or followed the seven folks who triggered a border security crackdown when when they defected to the South a few weeks ago, joining the 21,000 other former North Koreans who have had that same great idea since 1953.

He is, of course, just that: a dictator who starves people to death. The truth hurts — especially in a one-party state with a cult of the leader as messiah.

“SO, WHO PAID FOR BIDEN’S TRIP TO VEGAS.”

SOME QUESTIONS ANSWER THEMSELVES: Politico: Gas prices to blame for Obama administration releasing oil reserves?

WANT UNLIMITED SMARTPHONE DATA FROM VERIZON? Better move fast.

TODAY ONLY: A fireproof, waterproof 2-terabyte hard drive for $199.99. That’s kind of cool.

YEARS AGO A EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT MEMBER SAID THAT E.U. SUPPORT FOR THE PALESTINIANS WAS A “PROXY WAR” AGAINST AMERICA via America’s ally Israel. So what do we make of this? Europeans Are Major Force Behind Second Gaza Flotilla:

The flotilla has considerable public support in Europe, where opposition to Israel often crosses the line into anti-Semitism. Although a handful of Americans, Canadians, and Middle Easterners (as well as a few Aussies and Kiwis) are among the 500 pro-Palestinian activists hoping to sail with the flotilla, the majority of its organizers, supporters and actual participants are from Europe, which has become “ground zero” in the global campaign of boycotts, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) against Israel. . . .

The irony of all the Gaza activism in Europe is this: The European single currency is on the verge of collapse. Many European countries are on the brink of bankruptcy. The European social welfare state is crumbling. Millions of Europeans are out of work and many are losing their homes. Europeans are losing the war they started with Libya. Muslim immigration to Europe is out of control. Islamic Sharia law is becoming increasingly common (here, here, here, and here) in many parts of the continent. Considering all the problems besetting Europe today, the issue many Europeans care about most is … the Gaza Strip.

Read the whole thing.

COULD CHINA BE THE NEXT GREECE? “The Chinese government, which just produced its first national audit of local finances, announced this week that local governments could owe as much as 30% of China’s GDP. That’s a good deal more than the government’s official debt load of less than 20% of GDP. And some analysts are putting China’s real debt levels at three to four times those levels.”

Financial transparency hasn’t been a hallmark of the regime.

CLAIRE BERLINSKI: You Just Can’t Make Some People Happy.

CAN A WOMAN WHO BELIEVES IN SUBMITTING TO HER HUSBAND BE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES? “Won’t JFK just do whatever the Pope tells him to?”

What about a man who believes in submitting to his wife?

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR JOHN MCCAIN, WE’D HAVE TROOPS IN MORE COUNTRIES THAN I COULD COUNT. AND THEY WERE RIGHT! American Boots Hit the Ground in Somalia After Drone Attacks.

AT AMAZON, markdowns on building supplies and equipment.

THE HIGH PRICE of being a bridesmaid. Filed under “things I don’t have to worry about.”

“THEY TOLD ME THAT IF I VOTED FOR JOHN MCCAIN, THE FEDS WOULD HUNT DOWN MEDICAL MARIJUANA USERS. AND THEY WERE RIGHT!”

FOUNDING MOUSE. Part two.

VIRGINIA POSTREL: Hollywood Auction Ends Myth of Zaftig Marilyn.

We should never again hear anyone declare that Marilyn Monroe was a size 12, a size 14 or any other stand-in for full-figured, zaftig or plump. Fifteen thousand people have now seen dramatic evidence to the contrary. Monroe was, in fact, teeny-tiny.

The 15,000 were the visitors who turned out over eight days to oooh and aaah at the preview exhibit for the June 18 auction of Debbie Reynolds’s extraordinary collection of Hollywood costumes, props and other memorabilia. . . . In fact, the average waist measurement of the four Monroe dresses was a mere 22 inches, according to Lisa Urban, the Hollywood consultant who dressed the mannequins and took measurements for me. Even Monroe’s bust was a modest 34 inches.

That’s not an anecdote. That’s data.

The other actresses’ costumes provided further context. “It’s like half a person,” marveled a visitor at the sight of Claudette Colbert’s gold-lame “Cleopatra” gown (waist 18 inches). “That waist is the size of my thigh,” said a tall, slim man, looking at Carole Lombard’s dress from “No Man of Her Own” (a slight exaggeration — it was 21 inches). Approaching Katharine Hepburn’s “Mary of Scotland” costumes, a plump woman declared with a mixture of envy and disgust, “Another skinny one.”

The claim that movie stars were heftier in the 1950s is apparently an invention.

ALPHECCA: Dems Use ATF Fiasco to Push Gun Control. How about instead we have a bill to abolish qualified immunity for law enforcement personnel. It’s a creation of judicial activism anyway, and it has led to much mischief . . . .

CLARICE FELDMAN: HOW RICH IS THIS IRONY? “The NY Post article discussed here indicates the maid who accused Srauss-Kahn of rape was part of a prostitution/illegal immigrant ring in which the union which placed members at the Sofitel was intimately (pardon the expression) involved. I assume that union is the New York Hotel Workers’ Union, which makes this editorial titled ‘New York is the wrong place to prey on hotel workers..’ on their website too rich in irony.”

PROGRESS: Rinderpest, Scourge of Cattle, Is Vanquished. “The long but little-known campaign to conquer rinderpest is a tribute to the skill and bravery of ‘big animal’ veterinarians, who fought the disease in remote and sometimes war-torn areas — across arid stretches of Africa bigger than Europe, in the Arabian desert and on the Mongolian steppes.”

STANDING UP FOR FREEDOM: Virginia Tea Party organization fights planning commision issuance of search warrants for suspected “code violations.”

In a semi-related matter, reader Damian Burch emails: “I was about to e-mail you to suggest that you post something about Cory Maye, but I see that you already have. Now I have a question for you: Is there a (reputable) charity that we can donate to which supports citizens whose homes have been erroneously invaded by the government?” I don’t know. Any suggestions?

UPDATE: Pima County GOP Establishment Backing Sherriff Dupnik over botched no-knock raid?

Pima County Republican Party leaders voted late Thursday to take away party chairman Brian Miller’s keys to the GOP headquarters and called a special meeting to try to remove him from his post.

Miller has been under fire from party stalwarts for the past month, with meetings called in recent weeks after he criticized a SWAT raid in May that resulted in the shooting death of a man law enforcement officers suspected of involvement in drug trafficking.

Several elected officials and party leaders have complained his comments pitted the party against law enforcement at a time when city elections are looming and candidates are gearing up for bigger 2012 races.

In other words, they value political alliances with government employees over the constitutional rights of constituents. Nice to hear them make that clear.

Response: “They asked for my resignation on grounds that it is the right thing to do for the party because… well, because they say so. I declined.”

Tucson Tea Partier Robert Mayer adds: “Pima GOP chairman Brian Miller, who leans libertarian as we do, criticized the raid. Now, the old guard GOP that makes up the executive committee has voted to take away his credit card, keys to the office, and forbids him to speak as chairman. They are planning a change to the county bylaws to allow for them to remove him from office. The president of the AZ police union also called up every Republican candidate and elected official in the state telling them ‘you’re fucked’ if you don’t condemn Brian Miller.”

Another reason why police unions shouldn’t be allowed, as if we needed one after their politicization in the Wisconsin fracas.

A THOUGHT-PROVOKING LOOK at independent agencies.

WASHINGTON POST FACT CHECK: Barbara Boxer’s blatant rewriting of history. “This is more than just spin; it is a rewriting of history that borders on the absurd.”

UPDATE: Yes, yes, it’s true: You’d never catch Senator Mickey Kaus (D-CA) doing this. Sigh.

REMEMBERING when cigarettes were glamorous.

AIRPLANES CAUSE accidental cloud seeding.

AT AMAZON, it’s the Magazine Store.

ANN ALTHOUSE: “The message is clear. The liberal media want Ruth Bader Ginsburg out now.”

Plus this: “Abortion and affirmative action. Abortion and affirmative action. That’s the fixed point in constitutional law for a lot of people: it must work out in favor of abortion and affirmative action.”

JOSEPH BAST: My eight years as an undergraduate.

TARA SMITH REVIEWS Sonia Shah’s The Fever: How Malaria Has Ruled Humankind for 500,000 Years. With a brief interruption, courtesy of DDT.

AMERICA’S FORGOTTEN Prisoners Of War.

RECOVERY BUMMER (CONT’D): Auto Sales Weak For Second Month In A Row. “These car prices have really gone up an awful lot.” Stagflation!

RED WINE: Exercise In A Bottle?

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR JOHN MCCAIN, WE’D JUST BE BOMBING VILLAGES WILLY-NILLY AROUND THE WORLD. AND THEY WERE RIGHT! U.S. Expands Its Drone War Into Somalia.

WHY NORTH DAKOTA has 3.2 percent unemployment.

DAN COLLINS EMAILS: “Since you’re writing about beach books, could you plug Ric Locke’s Temporary Duty at Amazon?” Done! It’s proved popular with InstaPundit readers already.

THE ECONOMIC “RECOVERY” TURNS 2: Feel Better Yet? “Unemployment has never been so high — 9.1 percent — this long after any recession since World War II. At the same point after the previous three recessions, unemployment averaged just 6.8 percent. The average worker’s hourly wages, after accounting for inflation, were 1.6 percent lower in May than a year earlier. Rising gasoline and food prices have devoured any pay raises for most Americans.”

Related: Here Is Your Lost Decade.

HOW CHINA kills creativity.

CELEBRATING KHOMEINI in Kansas City?

IN THE MAIL: From Andre Norton, Deadly Dreams.

NOW THAT’S JUST SAD: RightHaven Lawyer Says Browser Ate His Homework.

WALTER RUSSELL MEAD: The Failure Of Al Gore, Part Three: Singing The Climate Blues.

My interest in the decay of the former vice president’s public position is partly because — like Jimmy Carter — he has had such an active post-Washington career. Not even Ronald Reagan won an Oscar, and Reagan (though he deserved it) never got a Nobel. Gore’s signature issue, the climate, is a major one, and Al Gore has been at the center of the most important movement of international civil society since the Nuclear Freeze movement of the 1980s.

The serial rise and fall of these vacuous civil society movements and the peculiar grip they exercise over the minds of some otherwise intelligent people is an important subject: why do so many people who want to help solve global problems waste so much time and money and, sometimes, do so much harm?

Read the whole thing.

RECOVERY BUMMER (CONT’D): Older interns signal gloomy labor market. “Once the domain of high school and college students, internships are more common among older Americans who are struggling to find jobs and keep their skills up to date in the worst labor market in decades.”

HIGHER EDUCATION UPDATE: Arbitrator: University Can’t Fire Professor Convicted of Exposing Himself.

HAROLD KOH AND JOHN YOO: “Two Peas In A Pod?”

BEACH READING: At Amazon, Bestsellers In Literature And Fiction.

INSTAVISION: I talk with Georgetown Law Professor and blogger Randy Barnett about the Supreme Court, attacks on Clarence Thomas, and the future of constitutional reform. (Bumped).

TRANSPARENCY: PJ Media Sues Department Of Defense For Climate Conference Info. “The original request was kicked all the way up to the office of the secretary of defense. There’s no valid reason to make it this difficult for PJMedia to get basic information unless the administration has something to hide.”

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Is The Sky Really Falling For Legal Education?

ON SALE, TODAY ONLY: An 11-Cup Cuisinart Food Processor.

NO SECRETS: Top Senate Republicans call for more transparency in debt limit negotiations.

CIVIL RIGHTS UPDATE: Gun ranges to be allowed in Chicago under Rahm’s proposal.

WALKING INTO MORDOR: A new Firewall from Bill Whittle.

THE LATEST ON Hugo Chavez.

NEWT GINGRICH’S Jewelry Industry Stimulus Plan.

THEY’RE NOT IN THE TANK, THEY’RE IN THE TRASH COMPACTOR: Video: MSNBC Feeling The Pressure Of Not Being Sufficiently Pro-Obama Or Something.

A BARACK OBAMA TAX CUT! ‘Temporary’ 0.2% Federal Unemployment Surtax Expires Today After 35 Years. Well, not exactly . . . “In his 2012 budget, President Obama proposed making the surtax permanent.”

DSK UPDATE: The Letter the Prosecution Sent Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s Defense. “As I say, this doesn’t mean she wasn’t raped. But it would be very difficult to convict based on this person’s testimony.”

MEN ARE MORE DOWNBEAT THAN WOMEN about America’s future.

UP TO 55% OFF in DVD and Blu-Ray.

STACY MCCAIN: I’m thinking of starting a new blog “The Other French Billionaire CEO,” because world-famous actresses and supermodels are obviously impressed by that kinda stuff.

CRAIG NEWMARK: We’re living in the Singularity already.

Hmm. Somebody should write a book on the social-media phenomena he describes, and their implications.

SYRIA UPDATE: Syrian forces kill 24, protesters tell Assad to go.

THE HOUSE THAT’S HOME to 2,000 companies.

POLIWOOD: Producer Paul Witt and Roger L. Simon Talk About Their Film “A Better Life.”

TAX ADVICE TO THE GOP, from Scott Ott.

OBAMA AND WALL STREET: Is The Love Affair Really Over?

FURTHER THOUGHTS ON DAN SAVAGE: So I’m thinking of the connection between “If you are expected to be monogamous and have one person be all things sexually for you, then you have to be whores for each other,” and “a good wife is a good sex worker.”

THE SECRET TO HAVING a commanding presence.