“THERE IS A THREAT. YOU NEED TO ACT.” Here’s a post from RedState on how to comment (you can do it by email) on the FEC’s proposal to regulate bloggers. [Relocated to keep this at the top a while longer.]

UPDATE: I should stress just how bipartisan and broad-based the blogospheric resistance is.

AIDS AND INDIA: An interesting grassroots Internet journalism project, organized by Sandeep Junnarkar.

PHOTO-FOALBLOGGING: Here’s my sister’s new foal, a lovely female who is, as of yet, un-named. She was born last night without incident, much to my sister’s relief.

MARK TAPSCOTT says that some media folks still don’t get it, and probably never will.

It’s worth reading his piece together with this one on Newsweek by Jay Rosen, though Jay posted before the latest Newsweek flap.

UPDATE: And it’s especially worth reading this Mark Steyn column. Also, don’t miss Ernest Miller’s take.

And, while not directly related, this column by Keith Thompson is relevant, and is also a must-read.

And doesn’t this item say it all? (Via Kaus). More here.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reacting to the latest Newsweek story, reader C.J. Burch emails:

The media machine is turning out debacles so quickly that it’s hard to react to them all. Maybe that’s their strategy. Simply overwhelm the rest of us with the sheer scope of their bias, dishonesty and incompetence.

That’s so crazy it just might work!

MEG KREIKEMEIER WRITES IN THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE on the uses and abuses of polls:

In early October 2004, Newsweek released a poll immediately after the first presidential debate, which showed a dramatic shift in public opinion in favor of John Kerry.

Did Kerry narrow the gap with his debate performance? Was he really the closer that many in the media had suggested he was? Newsweek was basing its headline “The Race is On” and accompanying story on a comparison between its two most recent polls. The problem, though, was that the polling data was inconsistent.

The October Newsweek poll sampled more Democrats than it did Republicans.

And the first poll, conducted in September 2004, sampled more Republicans than Democrats, not at all reflective of the historical composition of registered voters. . . .

Given the swing in demographics between the two Newsweek polls, of course Kerry saw improvement in his results. In fact, if he hadn’t he would have been in deep trouble.

And while President Bush’s support among Republicans eroded a bit between the polls, his support among Democrats actually increased. Kerry’s support among Republicans went up slightly, and his support among Democrats remained flat.

So why the breathless headlines?

Why did the news media report the data without first thoroughly reviewing it?

Why did the change in poll results pique the curiosity of a stay-at-home mom like me but not the much-ballyhooed investigative instincts of the reporters covering the election?

Read the whole thing. And congratulations to the Tribune for addressing the issue.

CHRIS NOLAN is calling Bush’s stance on stem cells “UnAmerican.”

I’m not sure that applies, but I do think that it’s wrong, and counterproductive.

MORE PROBLEMS AT THE HUFFINGTON POST, this time with their blogroll. I guess the “shakedown” period is still underway. . . .

BILL QUICK has put together a blog reporter’s kit that’s very similar to one I was writing about earlier. He’s quite pleased with it.

EXCELLENT ADVICE: “So, in the conclusion, please be kind to our internet friends. The sphere of the blogs it is big enough for all.”

ANTI-AMERICANISM hasn’t saved Gerhard Schroeder, as he just suffered another electoral defeat. More here.

NEWSWEEK puts the American flag in a trash can? And yet they’re complaining about Koran-in-the-toilet reports.

I suspect that they’re going to hear about this now. But there probably won’t be, you know, riots or anything.

UPDATE: Ed Driscoll notes, correctly, that many American journalistic enterprises engage in more America-bashing abroad than at home. I suspect that the Internet will make that much harder, as people are starting to pay attention, and to compare this stuff.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Brian Dunn has more thoughts.

MORE: Some readers wonder if it’s a photoshop. Well, you’re always right to acknowledge the possibility, but I doubt it. First, the blog it’s on has been around a while. Second, I got this email from Hong Kong reader Mac Overton:

Yep, the American flag in the garbage can showed up here as well. They asked me to “resubscribe” a couple of months ago, but I’ve refused. I’m simply exhausted from all the negativity. I used to like Fareed Zakaria, but I’ve found him to be annoying, self-righteous, and downright unpleasant of late.
Funny enough, they still send me a copy of Newsweek every week even though I’m no longer paying for it. I wonder if there are enough others like me reading the International edition who are now simply “fed up.” Yet, they continue to mail copies simply to keep up their “circulation” figures? Just another wild conspiracy theory in my little backyard….

A lot of newspapers seem to be doing that last, as I’ve noted before. Meanwhile, reader Jason Davis emails from Jakarta:

I’m an American living in Jakarta, Indonesia. On the whole Indonesia is a very friendly, moderate country where Muslims, Christians, and Hindus generally get along far better than news reports (from the left and right) would lead you to believe.

However, since the Newsweek story I have been worried for the first time since I’ve been here. The crazies now have an issue (true or not does not matter). I don’t mind America having to answer for things we ACTUALLY did but this is ridiculous. What really worries us the additional stories that will come in effort to defend Newsweek.

We have receieved a large number of official warnings over the last week from our corporate security group and our working group’s various embassies. [Warning emails from the Embassy and reports of Americans being stalked and harassed omitted.]

We are sitting here hoping the MSM in the U.S. will learn some small lesson from all of this and stop lobbing bomb shells our way. Stories like this are nothing more than toxic by product not very different from a 1930’s factory belching smoke. Back then the factory operators ignored all the external effects of their actions in the name of profit. The factories eventually cleaned up their act, will the reporters?

We’ll see.

And a note to the journalists: Davis’s email is a reminder that “free enterprise” and “freedom of contract” once seemed just as sacrosanct as “freedom of the press” does today.

MALAYSIAN TEX-MEX CHEF RAJAN RISHYAKARAN WRITES: “BTW, the cooking side of me doesn’t mean that I’m gay or (I wish) metrosexual. It just means I’m perpetually fat.”

Actually, I think you do a lot better cooking at home than eating out. I made shrimp provencal last night, and it was delicious and (relatively) low fat — certainly much healthier than it would have been at a restaurant.

VIOLENCE IN AZERBAIJAN: Gateway Pundit has a roundup on the pro-democracy protests, and what happened.

BLOGGLEDYGOOK notes Frank Rich’s cognitive dissonance over Islam.

This related post at The Belmont Club is worth reading, too.

TIM WORSTALL HAS POSTED THE LATEST BritBlog Roundup.

And this weekend’s Carnival of Cordite is up, too.

SISSY WILLIS blogs on commencement speeches, successful and otherwise.

REVEALING COMMENTS AT THE NEW YORK TIMES:

For a certain segment of the population, Nascar’s raid on American culture — its logo festoons everything from cellphones to honey jars to post office walls to panties; race coverage, it can seem, has bumped everything else off television; and, most piercingly, Nascar dads now get to pick our presidents — triggers the kind of fearful trembling the citizens of Gaul felt as the Huns came thundering over the hills. To these people, stock-car racing represents all that’s unsavory about red-state America: fossil-fuel bingeing; lust for violence; racial segregation; run-away Republicanism; anti-intellectualism (how much brain matter is required to go fast and turn left, ad infinitum?); the corn-pone memes of God and guns and guts; crass corporatization; Toby Keith anthems; and, of course, exquisitely bad fashion sense. What’s more, they simply don’t get it. What’s the appeal of watching . . . traffic? It’s as if ”Hee Haw” reruns were dominating prime time, and the Republic was slapping its collective knee at Grandpa Jones’s ”What’s for supper?” routine. With Nascar’s recent purchase of a swath of real estate on Staten Island, where it intends to plop down an 80,000-seat racetrack and retail center for the untapped New York City market, the onslaught seems poised on the brink of full-out conquest. Cover your ears, blue America. The Huns are revving their engines.

As a reader suggests, “Replace ‘NASCAR’ with ‘Hip-hop,’ and then ask yourself whether this would have run in the Times.” Certainly the editors would have objected to the condescension and stereotyping that run throughout.

On the other hand, perhaps this NASCAR stuff has gone a bit too far. . .

UPDATE: My race-car-driving brother notes that if you want real diversity, you should forget NASCAR and check out drag racing. Note the very cool photos. Meanwhile, reader Tom Carter emails:

Wow – what an article. Jonathan Miles has it all wrong. I’m having a hard time accepting the fact that a contributing writer for what is typically held as a good paper would fall into such blantant prejudices. Once again this smacks of the “blues” having a free pass at throwing stones. I wonder if Miles has ever been to a NASCAR function or even driven a stock car.

“The cars the drivers pilot — modified Chevy Monte Carlos, Ford Tauruses, Pontiac Grand Prix — are not so different from the cars Nascar fans use daily to pick up their groceries, shuttle their kids and get themselves to work.”

Statements like that are just an indicator that this man has absolutey no idea of what he’s writing about, and this just fuels the granishing disatisfaction with traditional media and their inability to effectively research their material.

Yeah. There’s not much overlap between a NASCAR “stock” car and the actual stock vehicle of the same name, and hasn’t been in ages.

I don’t mind these articles in which the Times tries to explain red states to its readership (and unlike my brother, I don’t care much for racing as a spectator sport) but I’d like them to do a better, and less-condescending, job of it.

ANOTHER UPDATE: SSgt J.P. Dawson emails:

Hey InstaDude,

In the Air Force (I’m active duty) I encounter a small group of hip-hop fans and a couple of Nascar fans every night at work on the midnight shift. There are conversations about Jay-Z and Nelly, as well as Dale, Jr. and Jeff Gordon. I tease both crowds, as we all tease each other about something. My New Yawk accent and thinning hair are the targets for them.

I’d never be so condescending of either group. Perhaps those of us in the military are just much more tolerant than the staff at the NY Times.

I think so, actually.

ELECTIONS IN MONGOLIA: Publius reports that things are going pretty well. That’s excellent news.

COMING SOON, new research on the health benefits of whiskey and cigars:

The vitamin is D, nicknamed the “sunshine vitamin” because the skin makes it from ultraviolet rays. Sunscreen blocks its production, but dermatologists and health agencies have long preached that such lotions are needed to prevent skin cancer. Now some scientists are questioning that advice. The reason is that vitamin D increasingly seems important for preventing and even treating many types of cancer.

In the last three months alone, four separate studies found it helped protect against lymphoma and cancers of the prostate, lung and, ironically, the skin. The strongest evidence is for colon cancer. . . .

So the thinking is this: Even if too much sun leads to skin cancer, which is rarely deadly, too little sun may be worse.

No one is suggesting that people fry on a beach. But many scientists believe that “safe sun” – 15 minutes or so a few times a week without sunscreen – is not only possible but helpful to health.

One is Dr. Edward Giovannucci, a Harvard University professor of medicine and nutrition who laid out his case in a keynote lecture at a recent American Association for Cancer Research meeting in Anaheim, Calif.

His research suggests that vitamin D might help prevent 30 deaths for each one caused by skin cancer.

“I would challenge anyone to find an area or nutrient or any factor that has such consistent anti-cancer benefits as vitamin D,” Giovannucci told the cancer scientists. “The data are really quite remarkable.”

It’s actually no surprise. Indeed, I’ve long been suspicious of the “all sun is bad for your” attitude of dermatologists, which has always seemed way over the top.

UPDATE: Bill Ardolino has a much longer post on dermatologists and sun from last year.

I AM A CITIZEN JOURNALIST.

Here is my pie.

UPDATE: It was strawberry. Yum. No wonder some people are jealous.

READER JAMES MCCORMICK EMAILS:

Does the latest NYT articles on deaths-in-custody in Afghanistan smack of diversion to take the heat off Newsweek? Set a fire somewhere else so Newsweek never has to acknowledge any responsibility for its acts. Newsweek can return the favour during the next NYT scandal. The MSM guild is all about authority without responsibility. Can’t have that change …

And it’s not just the NYT, as I’ve seen other examples of this phenomenon in quite a few outlets. As Martin Peretz noted, they’re circling the wagons. But by doing so, they’re only making things worse for themselves, as people are noticing. As The Mudville Gazette notes, people actually do more than just look at the pictures.

UPDATE: Reader Richard McEnroe emails: “Circling the wagons worked better in the days before blogging mortars and digital smart bombs. These days we call that a ‘bull’s-eye.'”

Heh.

CATHY YOUNG looks at when it’s politically correct to beat gays and kill women.

TODAY IS ARMED FORCES DAY: BlackFive has a roundup.

GATEWAY PUNDIT HAS MORE on the pro-democracy rally in Cuba, complete with video.

REDSTATE BUSTS THE HUFFINGTON POST for hotlinking. Give the newbies a break: They’ll catch on.