REAGAN VET TO HEAD THOMPSON EFFORT: It’s Bill Lacy. Here’s a piece by Lacy on prior Fred Thompson campaigns.

IN THE MAIL: Stephen Baum’s What Made jack welch JACK WELCH: How Ordinary People Become Extraordinary Leaders.

Also, Dan Farber’s Retained by the People: The “Silent” Ninth Amendment and the Constitutional Rights Americans Don’t Know They Have.

RANKING THE Democratic candidates.

DOONESBURY turns anti-Chavez.

WINTER SOLDIER SYNDROME. “Self-aggrandizing soldier recounts war atrocities. Media outlets disseminate soldier’s tales uncritically. Military folks smell a rat and poke holes in tales too good (or rather, bad) to be true. Soldier’s ideological sponsors blame the messengers for exposing anti-war fraud.”

GROWTH SECTORS: Online ads, former bloggers.

UPDATE: GM’s Olympics TV advertising dollars shifting to online.

BAD NEWS FOR JOURNALISTS: Google News is adding a new feature:

We’ll be trying out a mechanism for publishing comments from a special subset of readers: those people or organizations who were actual participants in the story in question. Our long-term vision is that any participant will be able to send in their comments, and we’ll show them next to the articles about the story. Comments will be published in full, without any edits, but marked as “comments” so readers know it’s the individual’s perspective, rather than part of a journalist’s report.

Lots of errors that usually slide by will get pointed out. I think it’s good news for readers, though. (Via TechMeme).

JAMES KIRCHICK IS DISAPPOINTED WITH SOUTH AFRICA:

This stance toward Iran is cause for concern on its own. Unfortunately, it is also illustrative of a much broader and more chilling trend in South Africa’s postapartheid foreign policy: one that cozies up to tyrants, and is increasingly orientated against the West–even at the cost of its self-proclaimed principles of human rights and political freedom.

Postapartheid South Africa’s easy relationship with dictatorships, it should be noted, is not a new development. Until very recently, however, it has largely been overlooked by the media. . . . For decades, the international community rightly considered South Africa a pariah state. With the fall of apartheid, South Africa earned the unique right to be a clarion voice for freedom and human rights around the world. What a shame, then, that the ANC pursues policies hearkening back to its country’s discredited past.

Read the whole thing. It’s very troubling.

STRIKING OUT on Barry Bonds.

IT’S A PRINTER. No, it’s a table. It’s both!

YOU’D NEVER KNOW that the Republicans lost the 2006 elections: “There are now 162,000 American troops in Iraq, the most ever.” The military part is going well.

Corruption, as noted here repeatedly, remains Iraq’s single biggest problem, and one that’s hard to address with troops.

UPDATE: Somewhat related thoughts, from Jules Crittenden.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Indeed: “The great lie from the anti-war side is that people like me don’t recognize the difficulty — or inherent tenuousness — of what it is we’ve been trying to accomplish in Iraq. But why else do these comfortable defeatists and inveterate contrarians think some of us have devoted so much time and energy to beating back their attempts to undermine the effort?”

HERSCHEL SMITH has thoughts on Iraq’s borders. He’s right, but I don’t understand why we didn’t do something like that years ago.

BRITAIN TO BUY two aircraft carriers.

EIGHT OUT OF THE TOP TEN PAKISTANI RECORDING STARS cut a CD that speaks out against terrorism.

MICKEY KAUS ON BLOGGER LISTSERVS: “Wouldn’t it be better if these debates were conducted in public, where readers could at least listen in?”

INSTAPUNDIT IS SIX YEARS OLD TODAY: Here’s what it looked like that first week.

I FIND THIS NOT ENTIRELY COMFORTING: “An 8-million-year-old bacterium that was extracted from the oldest known ice on Earth is now growing in a laboratory, claim researchers.” It’s true, of course, that it’s unlikely to be dangerous, but I’d prefer my germs a bit less robust. On the other hand, advocates of panspermia will feel their case has been strengthened.

JAMES FALLOWS: “There are a lot of smart people in China, but not many of them seem to work for the state propaganda apparatus.”

CLINTON EARNS loudest boos, biggest applause.

UPDATE: Video here and here.

“AN EASY FORM of academic pandering.”

Related thoughts, here.

MORE ON THE SURGE, from Max Boot.

NEW YORK TIMES: Army Says Soldier’s Articles for Magazine Were False.

UPDATE: More from Howard Kurtz in the Washington Post.

4,000 PEOPLE A WEEK, trying to leave Britain.

STILL MORE ON GOOSE CREEK, from Dan Riehl. Events are certainly curious. These guys are just lucky they aren’t Goose Creek high school students.

A LOOK AT race, dating, and double standards.