HERE’S VIDEO of Joe Gandleman’s appearance on MSNBC’s Connected Coast-to-Coast.

And here’s audio of my appearance yesterday on the Brian Lehrer show, where I talk rather a lot about the new outbreak of over-the-top judge-bashing. I think Lehrer was surprised by my stance.

Meanwhile, I just ran across this story which doesn’t encourage me:

Meanwhile, the judicial battle has flared up on an unlikely front: the Capitol tour circuit. At Frist’s invitation, David Barton, author of a handbook called “Impeachment,” in which he lays out the constitutional foundations for ejecting “overactive” federal judges, is scheduled to lead interested senators and their families around the Capitol this evening. Barton, founder of WallBuilders, which bills itself as a pro-family organization, specializes in the building’s spiritual heritage and has conducted numerous such tours in the past.

Barton, I believe, is a Christian Reconstructionist — I don’t know if he’s as extreme as, say, Gary North — but I think it’s a mistake for Frist to get too close to him.

UPDATE: More on Barton, here.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Donald Sensing has much more on the subject of “Christian evangelicalism, Christian reconstructionism (aka, ‘dominionism’) and Christian theonomy.”

MEGAN MCARDLE ON PRESS COVERAGE OF BANKRUPTCY REFORM:

I note only in passing that a lot of the coverage is missing the stories: failing to mention the corporate side of puzzle, picking out the wrong things to criticise about the bill, making it sound much more radical a change than it is, and generally repeating the absurd exaggerations of advocates on both sides as if they were fact.

She promises to do better.

IT’S ANOTHER CARNIVAL OF REVOLUTIONS with blog-posts on democratization around the world.

WILL THE NEXT POPE BE AN UNTHINKING SOCIALIST? You figure the odds.

‘YOU’RE IN TROUBLE, AND DON’T COUNT ON US TO BAIL YOU OUT:” Jim Geraghty reports that this is the message from Turkey to Syria.

AMIR TAHERI says that Al Qaeda is changing tactics and working toward a Saudi takeover.

MICKEY KAUS gives a negative review to the Kennedy/McCain immigration proposal. It strikes me as unserious.

UPDATE: The proposal strikes me as unserious; not Kaus’s review. Sorry — could have been clearer there.

QUITE A FEW BIG NEWS ORGANIZATIONS are supporting bloggers in the Apple case.

UPDATE: I guess I should mention that I joined in this Stanford amicus brief. And Howard Bashman has more.

BARCEPUNDIT NOTES A REPORT that Spain sold WMD to Venezuela. And here’s a report that the EU Parliament may investigate the matter.

UPDATE: According to this report, it was pretty innocuous.

THE BIG SKY BLOG is a collaborative blog featuring many members of the surprisingly large and diverse Montana blogosphere.

THIS STRIKES ME AS EXTREMELY POOR JUDGMENT:

Cardinal Bernard Law has celebrated Mass in mourning for Pope John Paul II in St Peter’s Basilica, ignoring protests from victims that his handling of the sex abuse scandal in the US Catholic church should disqualify him from the honour. . . .

Law resigned as archbishop of Boston in December 2002, after unsealed court records revealed he had moved predatory clergy among parishes without alerting parents that their children were at risk. More than 550 people have filed abuse claims in Boston in recent years and the archdiocese has paid more than $US85 million ($A110 million) in settlements.

Extremely.

MARK STEYN:

The CIA, as I wrote a couple of years back, now functions in the same relation to President Bush as Pakistan’s ISI does to General Musharraf. In both cases, before the chief executive makes a routine request of his intelligence agency, he has to figure out whether they’re going to use it as an opportunity to set him up, and if so how. For Musharraf, the problem is the significant faction in the ISI that would like to kill him. Fortunately for Bush, if anyone at the CIA launched a plot to kill him, they’d probably take out G. W. Bish, who runs a feed store in Idaho.

The entire intelligence apparatus needs a thorough housecleaning.

ANOTHER SCHINDLER:

A German army officer who saved hundreds of Jews from the Nazi Holocaust in Lithuania has been honoured at a ceremony in Israel.
The story of Maj Karl Plagge was unearthed by a US doctor, Michael Good, who began searching in 1999 for the Nazi who had saved his mother.

Maj Plagge sheltered about 1,200 Jews at a vehicle workshop while the SS annihilated the Vilnius ghetto. . . .

It is unusual for Yad Vashem to bestow the “Righteous Among the Nations” title on a German who was part of the Nazi war machine, the memorial’s chairman Avner Shalev told the BBC News website.

I would think so.

RYAN SAGER HAS MORE ON COLUMBIA’S TRAVAILS, and says that there’s bad leadership.

AUSTIN BAY HAS THOUGHTS on what the Bush Administration is trying to accomplish with the Bolton appointment.

“SCIENCE’S DOOMSDAY TEAM VS. THE ASTEROIDS:” Not actually a B-movie from the 1950s, but a pretty interesting article. Excerpt:

The holidays and the tsunami in South Asia pushed 2004 MN4 out of the news, and in the meantime additional observations showed that the asteroid would miss, but only by 15,000 to 25,000 miles — about one-tenth the distance to the moon. Asteroid 2004 MN4 was no false alarm. Instead, it has provided the world with the best evidence yet that a catastrophic encounter with a rogue visitor from space is not only possible but probably inevitable.

It also demonstrated the tenacity of the small band of professionals and amateurs who track potential impact asteroids, and highlighted the shortcomings of an international system that pays scant attention to their work.

Read the whole thing.

CHRIS SUELLENTROP IS savaging Seymour Hersh for lying. (Via Ed Cone).

MICKEY KAUS IS DEFENDING FILIBUSTERS: Though only in terms of treating the symptoms.

Meanwhile, I have to say that I think that the notion of impeaching Anthony Kennedy is just silly. If it’s an effort to mau-mau the Supreme Court, I think it will backfire. And if anyone is dumb enough to go ahead and actually try it, I think that will backfire in an even bigger way.

There are lots of things that Congress could actually do if it wanted to address judicial activism — especially since so much judicial activism, in areas ranging from sexual harassment law to immunity for overreaching police officers, is actually based on statutory interpretation, not constitutional analysis — that the continuing focus on things that won’t happen makes me suspicious. Rather than being serious about reforming the judiciary, I think that some Republicans are more interested in intimidating judges while bolstering direct-mail fundraising for advocacy groups and politicians.

UPDATE: Roosevelt’s court-packing scheme is invoked in this discussion and Jonathan Dresner sends this link to a defense of the Mau-Mau.

ANOTHER UPDATE: This column by Jonathan Rauch is worth reading.

HERE’S MORE BAD NEWS for the Canadian government.

CARNIVAL OF CANADIANS: The latest Red Ensign has been hoisted.

I’LL BE ON WNYC’S BRIAN LEHRER SHOW in a few minutes, starting just after 10 Eastern time.

BRIAN ANDERSON’S NEW book on “South Park Conservatives” is out. I haven’t read it, but it looks pretty funny judging from the reader comments.

UPDATE: When I got to the office there was a copy waiting for me. A review will follow.

YOU WANT GOLF-BLOGGING? Boy, are you in the wrong place. Go here, instead.

MEGAN MCARDLE LOOKS AT ELECTORAL FUNNY-BUSINESS IN MEXICO: Mexico is overdue for real democracy, but I don’t really know what to do about it; I suspect that the availability of easy immigration to the United States has tended to serve as a safety valve, discouraging the development of strong pro-democracy forces within Mexico. Which doesn’t mean that we should close the border to foster Mexican democracy, it just means that the situation is especially complicated.

Mexican-border issues aren’t something I know about (I haven’t even read Victor Davis Hanson’s book on the subject) but here’s a thought: If, as people like Hugh Hewitt believe, illegal immigration is the Achilles’ heel of the current GOP coalition, and if economic and political conditions in Mexico are a major spur to illegal immigration, then it would seem smart for the Bush Administration to promote honest politics — which tend to go hand-in-hand with economic prosperity — across the border. If they’re working on that, I haven’t seen much sign of it, but as I say this isn’t one of my issues.

LEBANON UPDATE: Publius has a roundup on developments there.

And Michael Totten is photoblogging on the Spirit of America Lebanon blog.