FROM MY EMAIL: OK, let me see if I got this right.

If you cross the North Korean border illegally, you will get 12 years hard labor – or shot.

If you cross the Iranian border illegally, you will be detained indefinitely.

If you cross the Afghan border illegally, you will get shot.

If you cross the Saudi Arabian border illegally, you will be jailed.

If you cross the Chinese border illegally, you may never be heard from again.

If you cross the Venezuelan border illegally, you will be branded a spy and your fate will be sealed.

If you cross the Cuban border illegally, you will be thrown into political prison to rot.

If you cross the U.S. border illegally, you will get:

- a job;
- a driver’s license;
- a social security card;
- welfare;
- food stamps;
-credit cards;
- subsidized rent or a loan to buy a house;
- free education;
- free health care;
- a lobbyist in Washington;
- billions of dollars worth of public documents printed in your language; and
- the right to carry your country’s flag while you protest that you don’t get any respect.

I just wanted to make sure I had a firm grasp on the situation....

JAMES OBERG ON NASA'S NEW STRATEGY.

On 15 April, NASA got its long-awaited marching orders from President Obama. The agency is to send people to Mars using a series of ”stepping-stone” destinations that are themselves of interest: Lagrange points, near-Earth asteroids, and Martian moons. The plan is pretty much exactly what Planetary Society president Wesley T. Huntress Jr. proposed in 2004.

Umm, well, maybe, but I haven’t seen anything to buttress Huntress’ claims that Obama’s program “proposes a more lofty, challenging, and appealing goal to the American public” and “will inspire many more American youngsters to go into science, engineering, and math and to do what has never been done before.”

Nor am I convinced that the ‘president demonstrated that he is fully engaged [with space exploration].”

BOATING ACCIDENT: this is a picture of a man with just seconds to live.


I’ll have to remember this when I get my boat ....

REPORT: Mullah Omar captured?

We can only hope this is true.

BP OFFICIALS TOLD CONGRESSIONAL REPRESENTATIVES that the Gulf of Mexico oil spill could grow at a rate more than 10 times current estimates in a worst-case scenario — greatly enlarging the potential scope of the disaster.

So what does the White House do? According to the Washington Examiner [4th item], “White House officials said they supported raising the cap on oil company spill liability to $10 billion ....”

Which is about all the “community-organizer-in-chief” knows how to do.

PRESIDENT OBAMA AT COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS AT HAMPTON UNIVERSITY:

"You're coming of age in a 24/7 media environment that bombards us with all kinds of content and exposes us to all kinds of arguments, some of which don't always rank that high on the truth meter.... And with iPods and iPads and Xboxes and PlayStations ... information becomes a distraction, a diversion, a form of entertainment, rather than a tool of empowerment, rather than the means of emancipation."

Translation: “I can’t control all this new media – yet – and it will distract you from my message.”

UPDATE: Kill the messenger.

NEW YORK TIMES tells Greece to abandon socialized medicine?

I would like to say the NYT’s left hand doesn’t know what it’r right hand is doing, but that would be silly – the Times doesn’t have a right hand.

SCHOOL DISTRICT ADMITS laptop webcams “mistakenly snapped” over 13,000 photos.

Sure, it was just a mistake. Move along, now. Nothing to see. Just move along.

TRUST GAP WILL HAUNT DEMOCRATS IN NOVEMBER. “Reform is hard and often unglamorous work. That's why politicians do so little of it.”

It not just Democrats who are threatened.

THE FLYING TWINKIE. James Oberg reports on the launch of the Air Force’s X-37B Orbital Text Vehicle (OTV) on April 22nd. In an interesting speculation. Oberg writes:

Observers suspect that the test flight may involve observations of another space vehicle. This suspicion was fanned by the announcement in late February that a Mach-5 hypersonic glider would be launched from California toward a Pacific tracking site during the X-37B's first week in orbit.

If that was in fact the case, it would be interesting to find out that the X-37B was able to determine the cause of the Falcon HTV-2 failure.

OBAMA PICKS KAGAN FOR SUPREME COURT. “While Dean of Harvard's law school, Kagan was known for her outreach to conservative legal scholars. While most doubt she would prove to be a Souter in reverse, I imagine Senate Republicans think Obama could do (and has done) a lot worse picking a Supreme Court nominee.”

TENNESSEE IS UNDERWATER and nobody gives a dang.

SORRY, JEFF, BUT YOU BLEW IT ON THIS ONE. I generally like Jeff Jacoby’s commentary, but on this one, he blew it:

It is remarkable how many Republicans and conservatives deplore the liberty-infringing perils of big government, yet applaud Arizona's draconian new immigration law, which empowers the police to interrogate anyone suspected of being in the country unlawfully. It is also perplexing. How can they brandish "Don't Tread On Me" signs at a Tea Party rally on Monday, then on Tuesday cheer a law making the failure to carry "an alien-registration document" a crime?

Uh, Jeff, first legal aliens are required to carry “an alien registration document” by federal law, not Arizona law. It’s been that way for years. Second, the police can’t “interrogate anyone suspected of being in the country illegally.” It must be in the context of a lawful stop for some other violation of the law – the same as for you or me.

With respect to the rest of Jacoby’s commentary, I tend to agree with him: once the borders are closed to illegal immigration, we should stop, take a deep breath, and eventually open our borders to all comers – legally.

PAD ABORT 1 (PA-1), the first fully integrated flight test of the launch abort system being developed for the Orion crew exploration vehicle, launched May 6 at White Sands Missile Range, NM in a completely successful flight. The video is here.

Note the speed at which the crew capsule is jerked away and the reorientation of the capsule prior to parachute deployment. Simply amazing.

THE PARTY MAY BE OVER, but it’s not the Tea Party.

THE ENERGY REVOLUTION. Six audio/slide shows report on experimental systems for getting energy, storing it, moving it about, consuming it, and conserving it. At the link, click on the image to watch the audio/slide show.

WITH 100 SEATS IN PLAY AND ABYSMAL CONGRESSIONAL APPROVAL RATINGS, Democrats are starting to wonder aloud if they should continue to support Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.

Her leaving being kicked out is a pleasant thought.

DETROIT FREE PRESS EDITOR caught on tape vandalizing $5M pedestrian link.

This would be laughable if it weren’t pathetic. But it does give you insight into the progressive mind: “Do as I say, not as I do.”

Via Instapundit.

IN CALIFORNIA, Barbara Boxer is so bad the Los Angeles Times won’t endorse her.

NEW YORK TIMES VISUAL OP-ED COLUMNIST Charles M. Blow strikes out again.

According to an article accompanying a Washington Post/ABC News poll released on Wednesday: “About 61 percent of tea party opponents say racism has a lot to do with the movement, a view held by just 7 percent of tea party supporters.”

According to Blow, the fact that 61 percent of Tea Party opponents believe the Tea Partiers are racist is proof that the Tea Partiers are racist.

Hmm. Let’s write the above paragraph this way: “About 61 percent of tea party supporters say racism has a lot to do with the opposition, a view held by just 7 percent of tea party opponents.”

By Mr. Blow’s logic, that must prove that Tea Party opponents are racist.

More Blow(hard):

Their ... strategy is to repress, deny and redefine. Following their logic, racial views not visible are nonexistent and those who raise the issue are simply projecting. It’s a fete of Freudian delusions.

Huh? Did I read that right? If I don’t express any view about race, then I'm racist?

Tea Party organizers may want to run away from the facts, but they’re not that fast, and the American people are not that slow.

And Mr. Blow is slower yet.