KOSOVO UPDATE: “Remember when the world-wise, honest, well-meaning Europeans used prudent, multilateral diplomacy rather than American-style brute force to resolve that pesky little Kosovo problem? Apparently, it didn’t take.”

POLITICAL PROGRESS IN IRAQ? Maybe. Bringing the Baathists on board. Hmm, and the French changed their position last week.

THE GHOSTS OF ANBAR: A new dispatch from Michael Yon.

A BACK TO SCHOOL Blawg Review.

KNIFEBLOGGING, THE DENOUEMENT: I wound up buying the Henckel’s Twin Cuisine. Tried ’em out at Williams-Sonoma, where they were cheaper than Amazon actually, and liked the way they felt in my hand better than the others — I tried the Global and the Shun, but I have rather big hands and they felt a bit small; the Wusthof Grand Prix was nice but the Henckel’s can tolerate being put in the dishwasher, which is inevitable around here sooner or later. So far they seem quite nice — they were a bit pricey, but I had a book-review check from the Wall Street Journal burning a hole in my pocket, so they didn’t seem too pricey.

A MUSLIM MARTYR IN IRAQ: Via Jules Crittenden.

ANDREW BREITBART is guesthosting the Dennis Miller show right now.

MOOSE FARTS CAN BE PRETTY NASTY, YOU KNOW:

The poor old Scandinavian moose is now being blamed for climate change, with researchers in Norway claiming that a grown moose can produce 2,100 kilos of methane a year — equivalent to the CO2 output resulting from a 13,000 kilometer car journey.

No, really. A Moose farted at my sister once . . . . . (Via Bob Krumm, who draws the obvious conclusion).

THE L.A. TIMES: Clueless, or crazy like a fox?

EDITORIAL PRIORITIES at the BBC.

DON’T GET CANCER IN BRITAIN.

Of course, to be fair, the VA hospitals in Los Angeles don’t look so hot, either. Hmm. What’s the common factor?

UPDATE: Questions about the VA story.

THE WAR ON DRUGS VS. the war on terror.

A SIMPLE SOLUTION for Congress’s low poll numbers, from Extreme Mortman.

ROGER SIMON: What’s the big deal about a National ID card?

I remain opposed to the idea. Here’s an old column opposing it, though I seem to recall that I got the cost figure wrong. But just multiply our current passport woes to accommodate the entire population.

BOOSTING SOLAR CELL PERFORMANCE, with nanoparticles.

YEAH, THAT’S THE TICKET: Why’s Congress polling so badly? Because they haven’t launched enough investigations. Uh huh.

VICTOR DAVIS HANSON:

After reviewing the latest critique of the CIA’s failures to foresee the pre-9/11 dangers of radical Islam, and while reading the final sordid details surrounding the Pvt. Beauchamp fables published at The New Republic, and viewing the latest phony wire-photos from Iraq (the poor victimized Iraqi woman holding unfired cartridges as ‘proof’ of coalition bullets that hit her home), I was wondering who will monitor our self-righteous monitors?

The answer, like it or not, in the post-Plame, post-Scheuer, post-Tenet era is that no one believes much what the CIA says any more about the Middle East; no one believes that a wire-photo from there is genuine or its caption accurate; and no one necessarily believes anything in once respected magazines, whether the Periscope section of Newsweek or anything published in The New Republic. The common gripe is that the administration lied to the public about WMD in Iraq; but what is lost is that once revered institutions proved disingenuous in their accusations and unreliable in their performance.

Yes. Can’t anyone here play this game?

UPDATE: Related item here.

WOULD YOU TRY AN untested cancer drug?

MICHAEL VICK FINDS A DEFENDER: Well, sort of.

HMM: Gadafy’s son calls for free media and judiciary.

CLAUDIA ROSETT: Ban-Ki Moon’s ethics test, and the UNDP: “So far, amid a welter of U.N. delays, denials, evasions, and broken promises, it looks like Ban is about to flunk.”

AT CAPTAIN’S JOURNAL, a report from Fallujah.

ADVICE ON LAW REVIEW SUBMISSIONS for the August window, from Daniel Solove. I sent out a piece via ExpressO last week. Upside: An acceptance within 24 hours. Downside: Many of the top reviews aren’t actually reading articles yet.

MORE BAD PRESS FOR CHINA: “A Beijing factory recycled used chopsticks and sold up to 100,000 pairs a day without any form of disinfection, a newspaper said on Wednesday, the latest in a string of food and product safety scares. Counterfeit, shoddy and dangerous products are widespread in China, whose exports have been rocked in recent months by a spate of safety scandals, ranging from pet food to medicine, tires, toothpaste and toys.” Bad for the brand.

POLL: 66% of voters oppose new gun controls. That explains why the Dems aren’t talking about it, I guess, and suggests that Giuliani’s stance may be trouble for him. No wonder Fred Thompson chose this topic for his latest effort. (Via Jeff Soyer, who has more thoughts).