DESPITE HIS ROOTS, Obama struggles to show he's connected to middle class.

I can roll up my sleeves and be just like you.

How ... cute.

WASHINGTON POST COLUMNIST Richard Cohen has a momentary lapse into sanity: “It is now apparent that there are some bad people there who should be detained way past the time they are eligible for AARP membership. It's true that the world does not like Guantanamo, but then it's also true that the world is not an al-Qaeda target."

THE OBAMARANG: "On almost every key issue, what Obama says he will do, and what he says is true, is a clear guide to what he will not do, and what is not true."

Read it all.

SARAH PALIN chides Rahm Emmanuel for his “f---ing retarded” remark in a recent White House strategy session.

Like Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof, on the one hand I dislike seeing Palin playing the hypersensitive “I’m offended because ...” card. Yet on the other, I wonder how the Democrats like it when the spike heel is on the other foot?

More: “Palin wants Rahm fired for calling liberals 'retarded'? Really? Isn't truth a legitimate defense anymore?”

SEARCHING FOR alien life on earth.

I’d suggest looking in the White House ....

”DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION Secretary Ray LaHood told lawmakers Wednesday that Toyota owners should stop driving cars affected by the recall ....”

And do what - take the truck instead? These guys are so dumb they couldn’t buy a clue.

And God knows we’ve given them enough money.

HOW OBAMA could save his presidency.

Instapundit’s right: it’ll never happen.

MICHAEL BARONE: Who is Obama trying to impress?

The answer seems to be left-wing intellectuals, academics, voters -- "the educated class," in David Brooks's term -- who decried George W. Bush's policies as reeking of fascism and dictatorship. We are making policies to please those who hang out in law school faculty lounges.

That’s being cruel to lawyers.

MALLARD FILLMORE accurately describes the Tea Party movement.

HYPOTHESIS: the most monumentally stupid ideas come from the ranks of the intelligensia.

I suggest the reason may be that the intelligensia are so smart that they know there is no need to check their hypotheses against real data. The rest of us are not so sanguine; we "trust but verify."