THE AL GORE SEX SCANDAL just got a little juicier. The big problem is this: “I need some more evidence before I pass judgment, but I’m not going to be happy no matter how this turns out. Either Gore abused his position of power to harass these women and scare them into keeping quiet. Or they’re all lying and trying to tarnish his reputation for some cash and their 15 minutes.” As with Bill Clinton, there’s tension between the “women don’t lie” and the “Democrats don’t do that” memes . . . .

PAUL RYAN: GOP Playing Politics By Ignoring My Deficit-Reduction Roadmap.

UPDATE: Reader Stephen Clark writes: “The Ryan Road Map would be a solid policy framework around which state Tea Party organizations could rally. It makes sense at the state level in so far as the exploding costs of Medicaid, and the unknown but likely enormous additional costs as unfunded mandates in the health reform act, will have disastrous effects on state budgets. Building state parties around this conceptual framework and holding aspirants to public office to its tenants would turn a movement into a serious political force.”

CHANGE: Government decides Sustainable Development Commission is unsustainable. Tee hee.

OKAY, I LINKED THIS STEPHEN GREEN COLUMN EARLIER, but this bit is worth quoting on its own:

Candidate Barack Obama ran as a moderate. He promised a “net spending cut.” Health reform was not, we were assured, intended to take over the insurance industry or feature an individual mandate. Taxes would go down for anyone making under $250,000 a year. “Too big to fail” was to be a thing of the past. Our nation was to become post-racial by the long-awaited election of a black man to the White House. And so it goes.

Instead, we got… more of everything. Taxes, spending, regulating, mandates, racial division — the entire liberal waterworks turned up to the max and pretty much all at once.

Indeed. And those broken promises are Obama’s biggest weakness.

ED DRISCOLL: Shirley She Can’t Be Serious.

Related: Shirley Sherrod, Behaving Badly.

CNN HOST CALLS FOR crackdown on bloggers. Of course.

UPDATE: Reader Eugene Heim writes:

I think you got to this point much sooner than I, but my reaction to that story is:

Who do these people think they are that they seek to determine what I should be able to read or hear? I am better educated, have seen and done things that they can only pontificate about (military, private sector, federal employee), and -going out a limb here- am more intelligent than these people who wish to regulate what I can know and think.

I hope I speak for many when I say, I might be late to the game, but I am awake and taking the field.

I think a lot of people feel this way.

NOW, A liberal tax revolt?

Kudlow has thoughts.

EARLIER, I MENTIONED JAMES WEBB’S PIECE ON AFFIRMATIVE ACTION AND RACISM, and a reader from Virginia emails:

What you’re seeing from Webb is the beginning of his 2012 re-elect campaign. He knows he won in 2006 for one reason: macaca. If not for Allen’s fateful stumble, it wouldn’t even have been close. Since then, he’s managed to vote for ObamaCare, Cap and Trade and a ton of other things that are hugely unpopular in Virginia.

A colleague of mine got a 20 minute live-operator poll from Webb last week, testing different messages related to Cap and Trade. Webb knows which way the wind is blowing, and he’s afraid that Obama will be a huge boat anchor in 2012. Add in the fact that Allen is considering running again, and it’s little wonder he’s beginning to say to eye-opening things.

It’s a matter of survival.

Well, especially now that the press has concluded that using embarrassing video without the full context is some sort of breach of journalistic ethics. . . .

Meanwhile, reader Bruce Goldston writes: “Let’s not get so worked up over Sen. Webb’s comments on race and affirmative action programs. Its very likely that his Op Ed was calculated by the White House as an attempt to stop the hemorrhaging of white voters and to bring enough of them back into the democrat party’s fold to rescue their candidates in November.” Hmm. Possibly, but I have to say I find the first explanation more convincing.

UPDATE: Moe Lane predicts disaster: “Senator Webb seems to have forgotten that he has a ‘D’ after his name these days, which effectively means that this entire article is thoughtcrime that will pretty much guarantee him a messy primary in 2012. Progressives do not appreciate thoughtcrime, particularly in their converts: they bought Jimmy Webb in 2006, and they expect their purchases to perform as expected.”

THE HILL: EXCLUSIVE: House Democrat calls on Rep. Charles Rangel to resign. “In a major development, Rep. Betty Sutton (Ohio) on Friday night called on beleaguered Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) to resign. Sutton’s statement comes one day after the House ethics committee charged the 80-year-old Democrat with multiple violations.”

SPENCER ACKERMAN: Wait, this is the guy who’s always talking about shoving people through plate-glass windows? Really?

UPDATE: Run away! Run away!

JONAH GOLDBERG: “Shirley Sherrod, who didn’t know who Andrew Breitbart was 72 hours ago, now knows him well enough to say that he wants to put all blacks back into slavery. If I were David Axelrod, I’d be calling this woman and beg her to stop talking. And, yes, she does owe Andrew an apology.”

UPDATE: Reader Bill Ernoehazy writes: “Glenn: At this point I think it’s worth asking: Did someone on Vilsack’s staff push for a panicky ejection because Sherrod had a _reputation_ for race-baiting? In less than three days she’s castigated the President, and now Breitbart, on nakedly racial grounds. What did Vilsack’s staff know, and when will WE know it?”

ANOTHER UPDATE: More thoughts from Dave Price. “And remember — the Obama admin now owns Shirley Sherrod. There’s no way for them to look good on this anymore. If they fired her, then apologized and offered her a promotion on a flimsy ‘context’ argument, then found out she was someone whose wildly inflammatory accusations make Reverend Jeremiah Wright look like the soul of racial unity and reasonable dialogue… the already oil-drenched competence myth is now taking a slash to the jugular.”

ON DVD AND BLU-RAY, the best releases of 2010.

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THE DARK AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL: Stephen Green on James Webb on race in America. “Webb’s column is a virtual declaration of war on President Obama — at a time when Obama’s head must be already spinning after two weeks of racial strife from the NAACP and Andrew Breitbart. And a ‘recovery summer’ that’s anything but.”

SPITZER TELESCOPE FINDS first-ever buckyballs in space.

IN CONNECTICUT: John Galt In Skirts?

SITTING IS BAD FOR YOU: Get Out Of Your Chair Or Die. “We did not evolve to sit. Just like there’s a Paleo Diet to bring us back to the diet evolved to eat we need Paleo Furniture for our workplaces. Office chairs should be relabeled death chairs.”

ROGER SIMON ON THE BORINGNESS OF RACE-TALK.

KCRW CHANNELS MONTY PYTHON in the course of defending Sarah Spitz’s Limbaugh-death-wish email. Not many people will swallow Spitz’s defense, I’m guessing.

JOHN NOLTE TO EZRA KLEIN: Put Up Or Shut Up. “Please, Ezra, if dirt is being done, please release the full archives so we can all the see the full context in all its fully contextual glory.”

UPDATE: Jonah Goldberg: JournoList Is A Symptom, Not The Disease.

DON SURBER: Hey, McClatchy, fact-check Biden. “What readers got was something from a JournoList, not a journalist.” There’s a lot of that going around.

JAMES TARANTO: David Frum Is Silly: Does he really think Dan Rather was the liberal Andrew Breitbart?

Are we to believe that Ben Jealous thought Breitbart was what Dan Rather, before his fall, claimed to be–an impartial and reliable purveyor of facts? In the unlikely event that the answer to that question is yes, doesn’t his failure to know better reflect a stunning incompetence?

No, you can’t cheat an honest man. Breitbart set a trap for the NAACP, and the NAACP walked right into it. He was able to do so because he correctly identified the organization’s moral weakness. Confronted by a video showing apparent racism at an NAACP function, its leaders appear to have panicked and made a snap decision to denounce one of their own so as to pre-empt the charge of employing a double standard.

It was a very effective bit of Alinskyite political theater, and in a way more so for Breitbart’s having gotten the story wrong. As it turned out, the NAACP condemned Shirley Sherrod based on a false, secondhand accusation of racism. Members of the Tea Party movement know just how she feels.

And when the Tea Party was facing false accusations David Frum joined the pile-on. So spare me the notion that he’s a voice for journalistic ethics.

VIDEO: Journolist’s success in setting the message.

SHIRLEY SHERROD, BENEATH THE HEADLINES: “CNN is strongly pushing the notion that Shirley Sherrod is a uniter, dedicated to bringing people together. However, her rhetoric beneath the headlines hardly supports that conclusion. . . . I’ve seen people, including some on the Right, claiming Sherrod deserves an apology from Andrew Breitbart. Fair enough, though I disagree. But I wonder, will those same truth seekers call on Sherrod to apologize for charging that, what Breitbart really wants is a genuine return to slavery? Or, shall we assume that the apology seekers actually agree with her? Come on, pundits. Don’t let your inkwells go dry, now. This is just getting fun. . . . Sorry, friends. But when I look below the headlines at the real Shirley Sherrod, as opposed to the fast spun media myth – I think I see her for what she really is. And it’s a very clear portrait painted in sharp contrasts between black and white. Far from bringing the races together in America, the Shirley Sherrods of the world accomplish nothing but maintaining any distance, if not actually driving them apart. It’s amazing how the conditions for having sainthood bestowed upon oneself have changed over the years.”

Maybe someone should ask Sen. James Webb (D-Va) to weigh in.

Read the whole thing.

UPDATE: Reader Rob Cantor writes: “Shirley Sherrod has become a constant presence on TV. The White House ought to get Vernon Jordan to find her a job in the private sector, because she’s giving off definite Cindy Sheehan vibes. The question is, will she attempt the rare Full Ginsburg?“

HAPPY National Hot Dog Month.

INTERESTING: Elton John Hatching ‘Animal Farm’ Musical.

WHEN WOMEN CHEAT, it’s men’s fault. Everything is.

PROTECT YOUR CASH WHILE TRAVELING using the multi-stash method.

LEAF FAR FROM SOLD-OUT, Nissan Encourages More Pre-Orders. Huh. I put down my $99 pre-order fee (heck, it’s refundable) but while they promised me I’d hear how to order one by June 30, all I’ve gotten is pointless promotional spam.

SPENCER ACKERMAN’S FLAIR for “imaginary keyboard violence.” “I have no idea how widespread this fantasy psycho behavior was at the Journolist, or how well it was received. Maybe the Daily Caller could sift their archives and run some denunciations of these sorts of posting. These libs spent years deploring Bush’s macho cowboy act and declared it to be the end of Western Civilization when Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was waterboarded, so I would like to hope that one or two pushed back against the plate glass window smashing and heart attack eye-bugging.”

HOW YOU CAN GROW A GARDEN In A 5-Gallon Drywall Bucket.

IN THE MAIL: Dangerous Games: The Uses and Abuses of History.

PAUL HSIEH: Donald Berwick, the Pro-Gun Control Lobby, and Paternalism.

UPDATE: Reader Charles Quinn writes: “I read the link you gave about Mr. Berwick @ 10:46 am. One sentence stands out. ‘Berwick has explicitly called for doctors to relinquish their ‘clinician autonomy’ and instead follow standardized government treatment guidelines.’ This sentence cuts right at the heart of Roe vs. Wade does it not? Didn’t that case enshrine into the Constitution that government make not interfere in the relationship between a woman and her doctor? Wouldn’t it be the supreme irony if the Supreme Court, or an inferior court for that matter, struck down Obamacare using Roe vs. Wade as a precedent? The agony for the right and the left would be excruciating.”

COORDINATION: Obama Journolist Operative Invited Other Journolistas to White House. “So… An Obama campaign operative interacted on the Journolist with sympathetic media types in the run-up to the election, and then rewarded favored Journolistas with a visit to the White House. Nothing to see here, move along.”

WALTER SHAPIRO: The Shirley Sherrod Saga: Lessons From Bureaucratic Blunders. “Playing the role of Inspector Clouseau was Tom Vilsack, a former two-term governor of Iowa, who briefly was an active 2008 presidential candidate. For all of his executive experience and soaring ambition, Vilsack and his henchwoman, deputy undersecretary Cheryl Cook, made every wrong decision in a reign of error that produced Sherrod’s forced resignation.”

THE SUDDENLY-UNDERSTOOD IMPORTANCE OF CONTEXT: Waiting For Some Apologies.

WASHINGTON EXAMINER: GOP Spoiling For A Fight Over Berwick Appointment.

POLLING: Obama Era Makes Clinton, Bush Look Better.

KEVIN WILLIAMSON: Deficits vs. Unemployment: You’re Wrong, America. “The either/or structure of this question includes an unspoken assumption: that these are competing goods, rather than complementary goods. It is as likely that our stimulus efforts are making unemployment worse as it is that they are making it better.”

TAXES ARE FOR THE LITTLE PEOPLE (CONT’D): Sen. John Kerry Docks Luxury Yacht In Rhode Island To Avoid High Massachusetts Taxes. A reader calls it “not-so-swift” boating. Yeah, you have to be grateful for John Kerry, who illustrates the problems with his class so well, and who isn’t bright enough to hide it.

UPDATE: Check out the Boston Herald front page, which is giving it the full Thurston Howell treatment.

MEGAN MCARDLE: Considering Elizabeth Warren, the Scholar. “Warren kind of waves her hands and mumbles about social programs and more supportive work environments. There is no possible solution outside of a more left-wing government. But the deeper problem is that some of her evidence doesn’t really support her thesis, and can be made to appear to support her thesis only by making some very weird choices about what metrics to use.”

POST-RACIAL? Sen. James Webb (D-VA): Diversity and the Myth of White Privilege: America still owes a debt to its black citizens, but government programs to help all ‘people of color’ are unfair. They should end. “Forty years ago, as the United States experienced the civil rights movement, the supposed monolith of White Anglo-Saxon Protestant dominance served as the whipping post for almost every debate about power and status in America. After a full generation of such debate, WASP elites have fallen by the wayside and a plethora of government-enforced diversity policies have marginalized many white workers. The time has come to cease the false arguments and allow every American the benefit of a fair chance at the future. . . . In an odd historical twist that all Americans see but few can understand, many programs allow recently arrived immigrants to move ahead of similarly situated whites whose families have been in the country for generations. These programs have damaged racial harmony. And the more they have grown, the less they have actually helped African-Americans, the intended beneficiaries of affirmative action as it was originally conceived.” Somebody should ask Obama and Holder what they think about this.

OVER AT THE CONGLOMERATE, a forum on Dodd-Frank.

SUING BLOGGERS: This seems like a poor business plan to me. On the other hand, if your real goal is to silence the blogosphere . . . .

UPDATE: Reader Joseph Dorsett writes:

The main way that Righthaven can be finding these blogs is through analyzing traffic sources. The solution for that is to not use any media generated by Stephens Media. No links at all. No links to AP generated content either. There is so much material on the web that there is no need to link (and send traffic) to any organization inimical to the blogosphere.

Clearly these people have no idea on how consumers find their website and how traffic affects their ad revenue. As circulation of Dead Tree News declines it will be interesting to see if rags like The Review-Journal survive by biting the hand that feeds it.

Yeah, don’t look for me to send ‘em much traffic in the future.

UPDATE: Some thoughts from copyright lawyer Ron Coleman.

AT AMAZON, it’s the Friday Sale.

SAME AS IT EVER WAS.

HOW WEAK IS OBAMA? “Sherrod may be the only official ever dismissed because of the *fear* that Fox host Glenn Beck might go after her.”

TIM CAVANAUGH: Do Public Sector Unions Drive States Into Bankruptcy?

CZAR OF THE OBVIOUS: Obama’s Economics Czar: Tax Increases Significantly Contract the Economy.

JIM TREACHER FINDS evidence of Spencer Ackerman’s presence.

POWER LINE: From Buckley To Breitbart. “With the hounds baying, Andrew deserves the support of conservatives in his struggle with the Democrat-Media complex.” In covering this story, Andrew’s journalistic fairness exceeded that of the New York Times, the Washington Post, or MSNBC. Perhaps that’s damning with faint praise, but the criticism of him is pretty weak, really.

OBAMA ON SHERROD: Vilsack Acted Stupidly.

Funny, the way some people are talking, you’d think Andrew Breitbart personally fired her his own self. Plus this: “A lingering mystery to this fading story: How did Sherrod find out in advance that the tape was about to be made public?”

WHAT HAPPENS IN VEGAS: A Netroots Meltdown? “It appears if the progressive-leftist activists of the Netroots have their way, what happens in Vegas is not going to stay in Vegas. They want it to play out at ballot boxes across the country in November, resulting in the Democrats losing seats in Congress. Obama has never been that openly kind to the Lefty bloggers. Rahm being in the WH hasn’t helped. Actually, the Netroots was more powerful in 2007, than it is today. The Democrats can only have one deliverer, after all. And it’s now Obama, not Markos Moulitsas.”

This, by the way, should be a lesson to the Tea Party folks on why taking over the party from the ground up is important. If you control the state committee, they can’t just ignore you they way they can if you’re solely a bunch of outsiders.

ED DRISCOLL on JournoList and Obama’s “Non-Official Campaign:” “A commenter notes another Obama official who was on the JournoList. Reader ‘Hydrangea’ wonders why ‘people keep forgetting that Peter Orszag was also a Journolister.’ Orszag is President Obama’s Office of Management and Budget Director.”

This does raise still more of those pesky coordination issues.

UPDATE: A reader emails:

Every talking head that goes on TV needs to be asked if they were part of JournoList.

Every university professor needs to be asked if they were on the JournoList. (Tucker needs to publish the list of names of all public employees that were members.)

For the record, I was not one of the professors on JournoList . . . .

MORE: Reader Brian Torrez writes: “Not one mention of JournoList on TPM this morning. Gee I thought these guys were so cutting edge. Makes you wonder what they are hiding?” Hey, they call it Talking Points Memo for a reason.

SHOCKER: More Muslim Riots In France.

THE SPIRIT OF JOURNOLIST LIVES ON ELSEWHERE: Typical: Obama’s ambush on Pete Hoekstra in Michigan was coordinated with the media.

QUESTION: “Did I Get JournoListed?”

BUDGET PRIORITIES IN ANN ARBOR: Lay off police and firefighters, put up an $850,000 water sculpture.

STUDENT SUES LAW SCHOOL in bankruptcy proceeding. Well, as the higher education bubble collapses, will we see more of this kind of thing?

UPDATE: Reader J.R. Ott sees this as a hopeful sign:

A surfeit of young underemployed/unemployed Law grads may be Americas answer to Washington,They can all practice suing the “Gummit” and bring the DOJ to a halt. Sort of what the Scientoligists did to the IRS. They just need a good Law Prof as leader/chief agitator.

Where would you find somebody like that, though?

SWAMP NOT YET DRAINED: Breaking: House committee charges Rangel with multiple ethical violations.

TEA PARTY IMPORTANT OR SOMETHING? Newt Gingrich Endorsing Cincinnati Tea Party Founder Mike Wilson. At least, I don’t think that Newt issues many endorsements in state legislative races.

HOPE AND CHANGE: Women’s Breasts Growing Much Larger.

COORDINATION: Obama Campaign Advisor Participated On JournoList. “One question that has arisen in the last week is how closely JournoList members, not only discussed how to shape the news to advance the fortunes of Barack Obama, but coordinated with the Obama campaign. Jared Bernstein’s position as an unpaid adviser and surrogate shows that there was at least one direct link between JournoList and the Obama campaign.”

UPDATE: Reader Matt Miller writes:

It would appear that the behavior of the JournoList group supports the arguments against the most recent attempts to regulate campaign finances. Why should media organizations have special privileges to participate in campaigns when they clearly are acting in a partisan manner. How much money would it cost to purchase equivalent advertising to match the columns and “news” stories that these journalists provide for their favorite candidate.

A lot.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Barry Dauphin writes:

It is interesting that a list of left wing journalists discusses creating a “line” on Palin (or anything for that matter). Even if the members mostly agreed on something like who they would vote for president, they were still competing with each other for readers or viewers. In a funny way, by operating on a party line, they reduce originality and the need for people to read more than one of them. It was a lousy business strategy, as the marketplace has shown.

When competitors collude this way, it’s also an antitrust violation.

TUCKER CARLSON ON The Daily Caller’s JournoList Coverage. “Gather 400 lefty reporters and academics on one listserv and it turns out you wind up with a strikingly high concentration of bitchiness.”

AL GORE’S march of the masseuses.

FROM MATT YGLESIAS, a JournoList explanation that doesn’t wash.

SO I WAS IN NASHVILLE BRIEFLY TODAY, and I saw signs for Vijay Kumar everywhere. “Fight Universal Jihad!” is his slogan. It’ll be interesting to see how he does.

A BACTERIAL ROLE in Multiple Sclerosis?

MARKDOWNS ON health and personal care.

SEDENTARY KIDS BECOME GAMERS, while active kids become hackers.

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR MCCAIN, CHRISTIANISTS WOULD BE TAKING OVER — AND THEY WERE RIGHT! In The Land Of Mao, A Rising Tide Of Christianity.

IS GLENN BECK really going blind?

UPDATE: Rand Simberg emails: “If so, Sarah Spitz will be doing cartwheels while laughing maniacally.”

FALLING BEHIND IN THE ROBOT RACE? “Walking, self-contained, adult-size robots are commonplace in robotics labs in Japan and South Korea, but there’s only one made here. Why are we falling behind?”

CAR LUST: Reporting from the MCA Grand National.

UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCHERS DISCOVER MORE MOON WATER: This time, inside the Moon. Key bit: “Now we have ready sources of water that can be consumed by plants and humans but also electrolyzed into liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen to develop rocket fuel.”

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR MCCAIN, REPORTERS WOULD BE LED AWAY IN CHAINS: And they were right! “A Wall Street Journal reporter attempting to interview an attorney involved in the corruption trial of former governor Rod Blagojevich was handcuffed by security officers this morning at the federal courthouse.”

BLUE HOLES: Some very cool underwater cave pics from the Bahamas, courtesy of National Geographic.

LET’S MAKE A DEAL: How A 17-Year-Old Craigslist-Swapped An Old Phone For A Porsche. “Starting with an old cell phone a friend gave him, 17-year-old Steven Ortiz of Glendora, CA, used Craigslist to trade up 14 times over two years and eventually end up with a Porsche Boxster. Here’s how he did it.”

WHAT’S WRONG WITH THE FDA? When Is A Disease Not A Disease?

I DON’T KNOW, I’M LIKING THE 40S BETTER: Women Most Attractive At 31.

MOST NISSAN LEAF DRIVERS expected to lease rather than buy.

A FISH, A BARREL, A SMOKING KEYBOARD. Mocking David Broder.

IN THE MAIL: Taxpayers’ Tea Party: How to Become Politically Active–and Why.

GOVERNMENT IS BORROWING, CORPORATIONS ARE SAVING. COINCIDENCE? “For a Keynesian, it’s always 1933. But it may very well be 1973, instead: the doorstep of stagflation.”

Plus this: “Once this latest round of stimulus (in the form of expanded unemployment benefits) has gone out the door, we will have spent more trying to stimulate the economy than we spent on the Iraq war and the Afghanistan war — combined. To what end? Ten percent unemployment? A tottering recovery? The Democrats will argue that things would have been worse without the stimulus, that it would have worked better if it had been larger, etc. That hypothesis has the political advantage of being unfalsifiable. But we can look around the world and see that other countries that have enacted proportionally smaller stimulus programs have fared better than we have. (The Germans, of all people, are wondering what has gotten into us, why we seem to be going all Italian.)”

DAVID HARSANYI: Obama’s Lack Of Faith: It’s Time To Start Trusting The American People.

PROF. JACOBSON: Journolistas even clam up in unison.

PROFESSOR BAINBRIDGE: The Truly Bizzare “Logic” of Dodd-Frank’s Shareholder Empowerment Provisions.

BEWARE THE EVIL CORN.

WASHINGTON POST: As U.S. suspends deep-water oil drilling, other nations move ahead.

WELL, THERE YOU GO THEN: Dem Plan to Cut Deficit Will Pay for Failed Stimulus … by 2130.

MEGAN MCARDLE: Tenure: An Idea Whose Time Has Gone. Some pushback in the comments, but with a higher education bubble set to burst I think we’ll hear more along these lines. Gulp.

TO SAUCE OR NOT TO SAUCE? The Great Grilling Question.

INSTAVISION: I talk with Indiana Senate Candidate Dan Coats, about the election, the future and more. Plus, he says he’d support federal civil rights legislation to protect Second Amendment rights against interference from places like Chicago. (Bumped, because . . . it’s my show!)

If you like these videos, please consider subscribing to PJTV.

HEH: What I Learned From the Shirley Sherrod Case. One bit: “Why Can’t Media Matters Read? Well, its not just Media Matters but almost every liberal pundit and member of the mainstream media. Who knew that Big Government was like Playboy Magazine. Everyone was so quick to watch the original video posted on Big Government that no one took the time to read the article that Andrew Breitbart wrote. While the article was critical of Ms Sherrod, that was not the focus of the article.”

Plus this: “Damn, those lefty ‘reporters’ really hate Andrew Breitbart. They couldn’t wait to pounce on him for this story despite the fact that they couldn’t have read his post that well. Do they hate him for his politics or because he does their job much better than they do? I pick both.”

THE TOP TEN racist incidents of the week.

CHRIS STIREWALT: “It should embarrass Republicans to be debating whether to tell voters why they should be elected this fall.”

DAN RIEHL: In defense of Andrew Breitbart. Does Breitbart need defending?

Plus this: “I’d add, the Left has actually manufactured completely false evidence of racism at Tea Party events out here. I have yet to see any outrage over that. So, pardon me if I don’t play useful idiot and place a kick me, again, I’m stupid sign on my back as I’ve seen too many of the usual hand wringers on the Right already do in this matter.”

Yes, when the JournoList crowd was fomenting deliberate lies about the tea parties, the Frum-types were happy to join in the pile-on. A lot of us noticed. Don’t expect us to be impressed by your self-proclaimed ethical standards now. . . .

JOURNOLIST UPDATE: A Note to All the Non-JList Reporters. “To all you non-JournoLister reporters out there, please be aware that your credibility has just taken a big hit, because we, your faithful readers, don’t actually know who is or who isn’t. You can thank JournoList for that, you can thank Ezra Klein, and you can thank the Washington Post, which has done its outstanding professionals absolutely no favors in any of this. . . . Peter Finn, I have long admired your reporting, and I admit it was an unfair gut check that made me wonder, are you JList and will it affect this story. I apologize for the unworthy thought, and I am entirely serious in saying so. But I am equally serious in saying that the JList compadres have made it (for you and everyone else, since I have no idea who was on the list) an uncheckable reflex just the same.”

UPDATE: Reader Brian Torrez writes: “What I would like to know is how much did the J-List folks officially and unofficially coordinate with Obama’s campaign?”

RAND SIMBERG: Will Congress Hand the Keys to Space to Russia? “Thursday, the House Science Committee is due to mark up a bill that would slash the $6 billion Barack Obama had planned for the commercial crew initiative (investing in companies to develop a space taxi service for taking astronauts into orbit) by about 96 percent, to $250 million. At the same time, the committee seems determined to resurrect the flawed Ares/Orion program. If this plan were to become law, it could leave the U.S. reliant on Russian rockets to get to the space station indefinitely. . . . If this bill becomes law, the Russians will be getting hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars in the coming years for a service that could have been provided by private American companies.”

Obama’s NASA-restructuring plan is a good one, and if Congress screws it up it will be very bad for the country. But what do they care about the country, as long as there’s pork. . . . ?

SETTING THE TABLE for fiscal restraint.