THOSE REVOLTING ELITES: Professor Bainbridge takes on the new elitism.

In sum, if by elite you mean the end result of a meritocracy -- a fair tournament in which everybody competes on a more or less even playing field (equality of opportunity) -- than I agree that I'd like the next SCOTUS to be an elite judge. But if by "elite" you mean one of Lasch's new elites, with their children of privilege, and their contempt for religion and traditional American values, then count me out.

By all means, read it all. And from the comments, I like this definition of elite:

"I'm a by-God American. I have no betters and damn few equals."

Linked from Instapundit.

SCHOOL LUNCHES a national security threat.

And as Instapundit notes, “So the one meal where teenagers are fed directly by the government is a major source of obesity, but we keep being told that the solution to widespread obesity is . . . more government? Uh huh.”

FLABBY THINKING: I may be fat, but you’re stupid.

And I can diet.

Link from Instapundit.

MORE RIGHT-WING VIOLENCE goes unreported in the media.

Oh, wait ... that was violence targeted against Republicans; not by them. Never mind.

A TRICKLE, NOT A FLOOD, but a growing number of American expatriates and green-card holders are “voting with their feet” and severing ties with the U.S.

My question is this: Suppose the elections of 2010 and 2012 manage to restore a measure of sanity to the federal government. Will these people come back?

Link from Instapundit.

EUGENE ROBINSON goes off the deep end again.

The overhyped Tea Party phenomenon is more about symbolism and screaming than anything else. A "movement" that encompasses gun nuts, tax protesters, devotees of the gold standard, Sarah Palin, insurance company lobbyists, "constitutionalists" who have not read the Constitution, Medicare recipients who oppose government-run health care, crazy "birthers" who claim President Obama was born in another country, a contingent of outright racists (come on, people, let's be real) and a bunch of fat-cat professional politicians pretending to be "outsiders" is not a coherent intellectual or political force.

With drivel like this you have to wonder why the Washington Post keeps him on.

ROAD TRIP ADVICE for electric-car owners.

Umm, take an extra-long extension cord?

OBAMA IN FAIRYLAND: Mark Steyn on President Obama's Nuclear Security Summit.

If you read in the paper that New Zealand had decided to go nuclear, would you lose a moment's sleep over it? Personally, I'd be rather heartened. It would be a sign that a pampered and somnolent developed world had awakened and concluded that betting your future on the kindness of strangers is a helluva gamble. What Mr. Obama and his empty showboaters failed even to acknowledge in their "security" summit is the reality of the post-Big Five nuclear age: We're on the brink of a world in which the wealthiest nations from Canada to Norway to Japan can barely project meaningful force to their own borders while the nickel 'n' dime basket cases [North Korea] go nuclear.

Comforting thought, isn’t it?

ACORN CEO: “We're on Life Support.”

Now all we need is the courage to pull the plug.

THE NEW YORK TIMES AND CBS take a poll of the Tea Party participants and finds them to be whiter, older, richer, and more educated than the ”average American“ – a blindingly obvious no-brainer for anyone who’s ever attended a single Tea Party rally. The Times then passes the data a couple of times through their spin machine to conclude that “these rich old white people have no right to complain. And they watch Fox News. Gross.”

The Washington Examiner relooks at the data and takes note of the obvious: “the middle and upper middle class never protest or get this angry, so this represents something very different in the history of American politics.”

But the truffles to be snuffed out are here:

It is noteworthy that 1 percent of tea party supporters think the current members of Congress ought to keep their jobs. But it’s more noteworthy that 10 percent of the general public feels the same way -- 7 points lower than before the 1994 elections. It may be true that only 6 percent of tea partiers trust the government, but only 20 percent of the general public does. It’s interesting that 74 percent of tea partiers think the bailouts were unnecessary but more interesting that now 51 percent of the general public does (only 36 percent think they were needed). It’s not surprising that only 6 percent of tea party fans hold the Democratic Party in a favorable light. It is surprising that the party’s standing with the general public (42 percent) is lower than any time since the fall of 1994.

The general public – that hypothetical “average American” – is following the lead of the Tea Partiers.

The liberals have failed to learn the First Rule of Holes: when you find yourself in one, stop digging. If anything, they seem to be bringing in heavy equipment.

DROP THE GUN METAPHOR. Takoma Park resident John Guernsey writes:

Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin continues to use the rallying cry "Don't retreat. Reload!," but now she's adding the disclaimer, "And that's not a call for violence!" ["Palin, with swipe at Obama, fires up GOP on midterms," front page, April 11]. My question to her is: If such a simple and straightforward statement needs to be clarified, why bother using it?

Er, because liberal readers are too nuanced to understand a simple and straightforward declarative statement?

VOLCANO PICTURES: some beautiful photos from Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull (wow!) volcano eruption.

THE NEW GM (Government Motors) proudly introduces ...



... the 2011 Obummer.

It runs on hot air, bull-shit and broken promises. It has three wheels that speed the vehicle through tight left turns. It comes complete with two TelePrompters programmed to help the occupants talk their way out of any violations. The transparent canopy reveals the plastic smiles still on the faces of all the happy owners.

Comes in S, M, L, XL and XXL.

It won't get you to work, but hey, there aren't any jobs anyway!

I’M ALWAYS AMUSED BY THE FREIGHT RAIL ADS that air on WTOP radio every morning. According to the ad, freight rail eases traffic congestion by taking 427 (or some such number) of trucks off the road for every freight train on the rails.

Well, yes, that may be true - but those are long-haul semi-trailer trucks that primarily ply the interstate highways. They don’t typically contribute to local congestion (with the possible exception of the outer loops around the city); it’s the thousands of box trucks that unload those freight trains and make local deliveries that do.