MARC LEVINE: Unions Will Regret Not Fixing Pensions. “Illinois’ runaway pension system is placing the state’s fiscal health in jeopardy. State contributions to the pension system have already crowded out payments to social service providers. But less focus has been placed on current state workers and teachers, particularly those with retirements more than a decade away. Their outlook is very much at risk, which is why their unions’ opposition to pension reform is contrary to their interests.”

IN THE MAIL: From Greg Egan, The Clockwork Rocket.

WALTER RUSSELL MEAD: Memorial Day: The War In Iraq. “That victory was much more than a dignified escape from a sticky predicament. The coalition victory in Iraq was a historical turning point that may well turn out to be comparable to the cannonade of Valmy. It changed the course of world history. We have not done justice to those who gave their lives in Iraq until we recognize the full dimensions of their achievement. The story of Iraq has yet to be told. It is too politically sensitive for the intelligentsia to handle just yet; passions need to cool before the professors and the pundits who worked themselves into paroxysms of hatred and disdain for the Bush administration can come to grips with how wrongheaded they’ve been. . . . All wars are tragic; some are also victorious. The tragedies of Iraq are real and well known. The victory is equally real — but the politically fastidious don’t want to look.”

WEINERGATE: Mickey Kaus calls for an outside investigation.

HEH: Best Memorial Weekend Lawn Poster.

ANARCHY on the Pakistan border. “To truly weigh the success of the operation you have to look at the overall costs and opportunity costs of the operation. For 10 days Anarchy, Cherokee and Dog were not operating in their normal areas providing security to the population, reinforcing relationships with key leaders or developing informants. Anarchy Troop alone burned through hundreds of gallons of diesel fuel that costs around $200 to get from the wholesale spot market to southern Spera District. Was Oqab Bahar the best use of man hours and resources? It is more than a merely academic question, it is the most important question for the leaders of CJTF 101 to ask themselves.”

A WEINERGATE REMINDER: “Wiener” And “Weiner” Are Two Different Words.

Copy editors take note.

HELEN UPDATE: Just talked to the surgeon — everything went well. And she didn’t get a new battery, but a whole new ICD — they call it a “battery change,” but the battery is hermetically sealed in the device, so only the old leads stay. The new gadget is smaller, better, and should last 9 years. There’s a lot of competition in this field, the surgeon explained, so the devices improve rapidly. Well, good.

FOR MAC OR WINDOWS: Photoshop Elements 9 now available for digital download.

Plus, a one-day-only sale on Photoshop Lightroom.

UPDATE: Dan Zimmerman writes: “Just a quick note to say thanks for letting me know about Amazon’s Lightroom sale. I’ve been a Photoshop user since day one and have wanted to try Lightroom for a while now, but always seemed to have better uses for $300. I couldn’t pass up the $120 price, though. And I purchased it (along with a couple of other items) through your link. Hope all goes well with your wife’s ‘minor surgery’ today.” Thanks!

FIVE FOR FIGHTING: Freedom Never Cries.

MEMORIAL DAY: In Remembrance.

I’VE PRAISED THE SNAP CIRCUITS KITS BEFORE, and here’s another email from reader Susan Harms:

I read you regularly and your comments on Snap Circuits prompted me to buy the beginner set for my grandson on his 5th birthday, Apr 28 this year. The 300 upgrade will be at Christmas.

He can read, knows his numbers and works on “plusses and take-aways” with his dad.

He can read and follow the directions for Snap Circuits and has built almost all of the ones in the book. even experiments on his own. His dad is teaching him to call the “resistor” by its name instead of “wiggly squiggly” as Liam called it.

He failed yesterday to get one to work, and his dad (my son) told him, “recheck your schematic”, Liam did and fixed it. How many fathers have ever said this to a 5 yr old. Keeps him occupied for hours. Builds them over and over. Loves the noisy ones.

(Of course we think intelligence is totally inherited, Grandpa and I are both PhD chemists, and his dad is an engineer (Co School of Mines) + MBA (TAMU).

Thanks for letting me contact you thru this email. And thanks for turning me on to Snap Circuits. What a genius invented it!!

Always nice to see kids acquire some real-world skills. And here’s an older post on electronics-learning for kids.

POLITICAL DYNAMICS: “In principle, other politicians could do the same thing. Maybe some have. What is different about Sarah Palin and her family is that they look natural on motorcycles. Imagine Barack Obama–or, to be bipartisan, Mitt Romney–trying to mingle with the bikers and look at home on a Harley. Heck, if one of the motorcycles broke down, Todd undoubtedly could fix it.”

Related: “Once again, the former vice presidential nominee has proven she can tilt the political world on its axis in an instant. Last week, Tim Pawlenty, Mitt Romney and Michele Bachmann took their campaigns to Iowa, but it was the news of Palin’s bus tour that really had people talking. She made a simple announcement on her website, and she got all the attention, all the interest.”

STEVEN DEN BESTE: “This is the next step in a minor debate with Instapundit. This response is quite long, so I figured I’d post it here instead of mailing it to him.”

I hate to start debating radio transmission with Steven Den Beste of all people, but I’m not sure there’s an issue. Den Beste says to get the power density low enough to be safe, you need a much-bigger-than 100 square kilometer receiver. That’s not impractically large, as he suggests, when you recognize that it’s a receiver for — as he notes — a godawful lot of power. Indeed, as I recall, and as this Wikipedia entry indicates, the old Solar Power Satellite concept called for receiver arrays that were kilometers square to receive considerably smaller — gigawatt-range rather than terawatt-range — power inputs. And these were to be open dipole arrays that would allow crops to be grown underneath, accepting a small reduction in efficiency for a much lower footprint.

That’s not to say that the Japanese idea is a good one (what do you do about the Earth’s rotation, something that isn’t a problem for geosynchronous satellites), but one of the characteristics of the old SPS idea was design for low-density beams that would ensure that a station couldn’t be turned into a weapon. Obviously, that would have to be the case with any lunar power system, too.

UPDATE: Mark Whittington emails: “Glenn – The Japanese scheme seems to be based on a concept developed by David Criswell some years ago. He has a paper that answers some of the questions being raised. For one thing, the article seems to have made a mistake about the 13,000 TW figure. That is the amount of solar energy the entire lunar surface recieves. Criswell’s scheme would transmit 20 TW which he says would provide sufficient energy for 10 billion people.”

More here.

“HACKTIVISTS” AGAINST FREE SPEECH? PBS hacked in retribution for Frontline Wikileaks episode.

CHANGE: NERVOUS INVESTORS DEMAND HIGHER RETURNS. “The world looks a lot more dangerous than it did only a few months ago and signs are that U.S. stock investors are starting to demand more for the added risk. With important manufacturing and jobs data due next week, it could start to get even riskier.”

TALK ON CAMPUS.

MARK STEYN: Cowed By Udderly Insane Regulations.

The hyper-regulatory state is unrepublican. It strikes at one of the most basic pillars of free society: equality before the law. When you replace “law” with “regulation,” equality before it is one of the first casualties. In such a world, there is no law, only a hierarchy of privilege more suited to a sultan’s court than a self-governing republic. If you don’t want to be subject to “tooth-level surveillance,” you better know who to call in Washington. Teamsters Local 522 did, and the United Federation of Teachers, and the Chicago Plastering Institute. And as a result they’ve all been “granted” ObamaCare “waivers.” Rule, Obama! Obama, waive the rules! If only for his cronies. Americans are being transferred remorselessly from the rule of law to rule by an unaccountable bureaucracy of micro-regulatory preferences, subsidies, entitlements and incentives that determine which of the multiple categories of Unequal-Before-The-Law Second-Class (or Third-Class, or Fourth-Class) Citizenship you happen to fall into.

Read the whole thing.

YEAH, I’M UP EARLY: Taking Helen to the hospital so she can have her ICD battery changed. As heart surgery goes, it’s pretty minor — but the only minor surgery is surgery that happens to someone else. Blogging should be uninterrupted, since I’ll mostly be waiting around, since that’s what hospitals excel at . . . .

WEINERGATE UPDATE: Student who got lewd pic from Rep. Anthony Weiner’s Twitter account denies she’s his mistress. Plus, a picture of Weiner and his wife making a public appearance holding hands.

CHINA CENSORS WEB to curb Inner Mongolia protests.

BEEN DOWN SO LONG: For GOP, Nowhere To Go But Up.

JUST A NOTE TO THE FOLKS WHO SHOP VIA THE AMAZON LINKS ON INSTAPUNDIT: Your support is much appreciated. Thanks!

ARE THE ACADEMIC ELITE YOUR MORAL SUPERIORS? Absolutely. Ask practically any professor. And who would know better?

DENIAL: Rep. Weiner: I did not send Twitter crotch pic. Do you believe him?

Related: Rep. Weiner Still Claims Twitter Account Hacked; Big Questions Remain.