A STORY OF HOPE: How gun rights have expanded over the last 20 years. Well, yes, they've been enshrined in constitutional law, but as recently 40 years ago, they were assumed. From 40 to 20 years ago, they were trampled; now the pendulum has swung back to sanity.

OBAMA TO PUTIN: If you don't back off in the Ukraine, I'm gonna keep talking....

SO MANY YEARS, so little change. Five years ago today.

TEXAS BEWARE: "The way you turn states from red to purple is to make blue states so intolerable that a lot of people flee them for red states. Then those voters stupidly vote for the same disastrous policies in their new homes."

CONTROVERSY: Facebook photo shows baby holding rifle. B-B-But it's a Bolt Action Rifle (or what's more commonly referred to as a 'deer rifle').

I wonder what they would think of this photo of my granddaughter shooting a h-h-handgun. (And before the faint-hearted among you get your knickers in a twist, she was allowed to load the magazine - not the weapon - under close supervision.)

HEH: "At some point, you've hoarded enough money."

CENTERS FOR MEDICARE AND MEDICAID SERVICES: Two Thirds of Small Businesses to See Premiums Spike Under Obamacare.

The Affordable Care Act requires all non-grandfathered health insurance coverage in the individual and group markets to be guaranteed issue and guaranteed renewable. In addition, all non-grandfathered insurance plans and policies in the individual and group markets can vary premium rates based only on age, family status, geography, and tobacco use, and the variation in the age and tobacco use factors is limited. This new premium rating requirement will impact the premiums paid by individuals and families working for small employers who offer health insurance. Specifically, we have estimated that the premium rates for roughly 11 million people will increase and about 6 million people are expected to experience a premium rate reduction due to sections 2701 through 2703 of the PHS Act.

Net: 5 million more losers than winners. And here's the really interesting part, if you choose to read the full report [p.3, footnote 3]:

ACA exempts certain groups of individuals from this mandate.... Illegal immigrants, individuals or households who do not have [sic] file a tax return because their income is too low or cannot afford the cheapest health insurance are also exempt from this mandate.

In plain English, those who had the worst healthcare (and cost taxpayers the most) pre-ObamaCare still won't be covered. ObamaCare has taken those who have at least marginally decent insurance coverage, made it worse and more expensive for them, and didn't do diddly-squat for those who need help the most.

The full report is here.

NOT EVEN A SMIDGEN OF CORRUPTION: After 3 years, 2 months and 10 days the Tea Party Patriots are granted tax exempt status by phone call on eve of congressional testimony.

Here's where it gets interesting: the exempt status was granted only after TPP co-founder Jenny Beth Martin was announced as a last-minute addition to the panel testifying before Congress. Here's what Ms. Martin had to say before the committee investigating pending 401(c) regulatory changes:

One of the most egregious is the requirement that we track, calculate, and report the activities of thousands of volunteers. The army of citizens who volunteer for their country is the backbone of every group in America: tea party, moderate, or progressive. Volunteerism is one of our greatest character traits. These proposed regulations would treat volunteers as a problem, annihilating relationships that are at the heart of an informed electorate.

The proposed rules create cracks in the trust that is the foundation of our nation. A government of the people, by the people, and for the people must trust the people, and the people must trust the government. When the people are afraid of a government agency, when they see that agency as a bunch of bullies who abuse power, the trust is shattered. Free people should not fear a politicized bureaucracy that delves into their social media and communications to determine what they said, whom they heard speak, and what they think about their government.

Something stinks at the IRS, and it's not a dead fish.

AIRLANDER: world's longest airship. Actually it's fairly old technology; it was developed in England, bought by the U.S. Army to test heavy-lift capabilities, canceled when budget limitations ended Army involvement, and returned eventually to England.

Lockheed Martin was involved in a similar venture in the late 1990's; it too, got canceled when it became obvious it was not a commercially viable enterprise.

Nevertheless its sheer size excites the imagination; I hope it succeeds.

REPUBLICAN HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN MIKE ROGERS: “I think Putin is playing chess, and ... we’re playing marbles.”

Rogers is being generous.

BEATING SWORDS into plowshares food stamps.

RANDOM THOUGHTS from the retirement lane. Being forced to watch the Viagra and Cialis commercials night after night, I wonder when the couples will include two males....

BAN ASSAULT DONUTS!

And more from PowerLine's week in pictures.

METAPHOR ALERT: Minnesota light rail train runs off tracks after Obama lauds it in visit.

You can't help but think 'ObamaCare' when you read it....

POLL: Not even the uninsured like ObamaCare.

They're beginning to pay attention.

UPDATE: Seniors don't like ObamaCare either.

A CAUTION about expertise. Whenever you hear someone declared an 'expert', keep in mind the origin of the word: from 'ex', meaning has-been, and 'spurt', a drip under pressure.

NEW EXCUSE: Keystone XL pipeline may cause cancer. The evidence is much stronger that life causes cancer. So should we ban living?

LOCKED OUT: the real job lock.

KEPLER SPACE TELESCOPE finds and confirms over 700 new exoplanets. No intelligent life found; only progressives.

More seriously, the space telescope website is here.

NASA CAPTURES photos of Alaska landslide. More photos here.