ALI ETERAZ’S Children of Dust: A Memoir of Pakistan gets a review in the Washington Post.

MARK STEYN: Obama Makes Bush His Blame Czar.

WANT MORE TERROR-WAR NEWS? Visit Fred Pruitt’s Rantburg.com.

MAKING FRANK RICH nervous.

THE POLITICAL IMPLICATIONS of smartphones.

FROM PUBLISHER’S WEEKLY, the top 10 books of 2009.

STUFF WHITE PEOPLE don’t like.

SHOCKER: British nuclear expert’s 17th floor UN death plunge ‘was not suicide’.

SOME CHEESY Halloween pickup lines sorted by costume. Emphasis on the cheesy . . .

ANN ALTHOUSE: “Kirsch, like so many others — most of us Baby Boomers? — is, I think, deeply invested in the notion that businessmen are boring and uncreative.”

UPDATE: Tom Maguire: Now, If Book Reviewers Read The Books… “The review would be even more interesting if the reviewer, Adam Kirsch of The New Republic, showed a token familiarity with Ms. Rand’s work, or even with life here in reality.”

JOHN HINDERAKER: Bush-Era Leaks Were Dangerous After All. “Many commentators have noted that this is one more instance where the Obama administration, now that it is in possession of the facts and charged with responsibility for the nation’s security, has acted in full concert with much-reviled policies of the Bush administration. That’s a valid point, and Holder’s press release on the subject, which you can read here, is almost humorous in its labored attempt to create the impression that use of the state secrets privilege by the Obama administration is somehow different from the identical use of the identical privilege by the previous administration. . . . But the administration’s decision merits a closer look because of the nature of the Shubert case.”

GREEN JOBS! Huge Texas Wind Farm’s Turbines Will Be Made in China.

“COME FOR THE CULTURE WAR, stay for the chicks.” “The primary reason our womenfolk are at war with the looming spectre of the nanny state is because you can’t buy Jimmy Choos in a socialist paradise.” This should provoke a reaction.

PETER SUDERMAN: $900 Billion House Health-Care Reform Bill Likely to Cost More than $900 Billion. Well, if by “likely” you mean “pretty damn certain.”

A BUNCH OF interesting food links.

STEVE CROWDER Trick Or Treat At The White House.

A really scary trick would have been one of these out front . . . .

OKAY SO THE SCOZZAFAVA WITHDRAWAL came too late to update my Sunday Washington Examiner column. But since the point of my column is that what happens after the election is more important than the election itself, that’s okay . . .

THOMAS SOWELL: Dismantling America, Part II. “This issue is too serious for squeamish silence.”

PROF. JACOBSON: “Expect a full-out media blitz by the Democrats in the last three days of the campaign to portray Hoffman as the re-incarnation of Timothy McVeigh.”

DON SURBER: “It took Republicans 6 years and 2 wars to lose their enthusiasm for President Bush. It took Democrats one year. Change. Hope. Ohmigodwhatdidwedo?”

CORZINE CAMPAIGN AIDE BUSTED ON DRUG CHARGES? But if it’s true, why are New Jersey media scrubbing the story from their sites?

UPDATE: The Star-Ledger has this: Paramus man claiming to work for Corzine arrested on drug charges. Corzine’s campaign: “No one has ever heard of this guy.”

WHY MOMMY loves the state! (Bumped).

SO WILL THE UNITED STATES’ AGREEMENT ON “HATE SPEECH” be used to end-run the First Amendment?

Only if they think they can get away with it. But if so, yeah. Of course.

THE NOBLEST ROMAN OF THEM ALL objects to the Obama comparison.

IN THE MAIL: From Bo Hoefinger, Bad to the Bone: Memoir of a Rebel Doggie Blogger.