CORZINE UPDATE:

A self-described gadfly withdrew his complaint Tuesday against Gov. Jon S. Corzine for failing to wear a seat belt when he was critically injured in a highway crash. State police have not yet decided whether to ticket the governor.

The complaint filed by Larry Angel was withdrawn just as a judge was to decide whether to approve the complaint. Corzine was released from a hospital Monday and apologized for not wearing his seat belt when his official SUV crashed on April 12.

“The governor’s statements of taking responsibility swayed him,” said Roseanne Lugg, the Galloway court administrator. “That was all Mr. Angel was after.”

Of course, Corzine immediately broke the speed limit thereafter . . . .

Corzine just seems perfectly representative of our political class.

BUT OF COURSE: Vanishing bees are a sign of the apocalypse.

FOR MAY DAY, a day of remembrance.

And read this post from Brink Lindsey, who’s back blogging again.

“QUOTE DOCTORING” in the publishing world.

I GUESS FRED THOMPSON MUST BE TAKING OFF, because opponents are roaming Nashville looking for dirt:

Nashville law circles were abuzz last week about professional snoops – either private investigators or opposition research political types – combing public records in Metro buildings looking for potential dirt on Thompson. Property records seemed to be at the top of their list.

Obviously, someone’s scared.

OUR AHISTORICAL MEDIA: Shirley who?

MORE ON THE AL-MASRI STORY FROM RICHARD MINITER: “Most likely, our sources tell us, al Masri was felled by former insurgents who have come over to the American side.”

UPDATE: A warning about chicken-counting.

BERNARD HARCOURT HAS MORE on mental hospitals, prisons, and homicide rates.

IN THE MAIL: Some Flabber Floover puzzles. They look pretty challenging. I don’t know if they’ll be able to match the fun of the Ball of Whacks, though. What could?

MCCAIN FAVORS a “league of democracies.”

UPDATE: Related thoughts, and a Kaus connection, here.

HOWARD KURTZ: “Somewhere out there, there must be someone defending George Tenet. I’m just having trouble finding that person.”

BILL RICHARDSON’S plan for Iraq.

FRED THOMPSON HAS THOUGHTS on popularity.

BILL FRIST IS EXONERATED: No big surprise, but don’t look for a lot of press on this.

GETTING THE WAR ON DRUGS out of the way of the war on terror. About time. Let’s hope this represents a trend.

AL-MASRI JOINS ZARQAWI. And there’s some interesting history on when he entered Iraq: “He probably entered Iraq in 2002, before al-Zarqawi, and may have helped establish the first al-Qaida cell in the Baghdad area.” Pre-invasion? But I thought Saddam and Al Qaeda had nothing to do with each other. . . .

UPDATE: Al Qaeda’s structure has its advantages: “But if it’s ‘decentralised’ in a way that has them killing each other, that’s a good thing.”

Of course, we’re fighting among ourselves, too. But at least Joe Biden’s violent imagery is just, well, imagery.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Biden seems a bit too fond of this particular imagery.

TEXAS GOV. RICK PERRY wants to allow concealed carry everywhere. If it saves just one life, it’s worth it!

I GUESS DOCTORS CAN’T “BURY THEIR MISTAKES” ANY MORE:

What they saw amazed them, according to Dr. Lance Becker, an authority on emergency medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. “After one hour,” he says, “we couldn’t see evidence the cells had died. We thought we’d done something wrong.” In fact, cells cut off from their blood supply died only hours later.

But if the cells are still alive, why can’t doctors revive someone who has been dead for an hour? Because once the cells have been without oxygen for more than five minutes, they die when their oxygen supply is resumed. It was that “astounding” discovery, Becker says, that led him to his post as the director of Penn’s Center for Resuscitation Science, a newly created research institute operating on one of medicine’s newest frontiers: treating the dead. . . .

With this realization came another: that standard emergency-room procedure has it exactly backward. When someone collapses on the street of cardiac arrest, if he’s lucky he will receive immediate CPR, maintaining circulation until he can be revived in the hospital. But the rest will have gone 10 or 15 minutes or more without a heartbeat by the time they reach the emergency department. And then what happens? “We give them oxygen,” Becker says. “We jolt the heart with the paddles, we pump in epinephrine to force it to beat, so it’s taking up more oxygen.” Blood-starved heart muscle is suddenly flooded with oxygen, precisely the situation that leads to cell death. Instead, Becker says, we should aim to reduce oxygen uptake, slow metabolism and adjust the blood chemistry for gradual and safe reperfusion.

As Miracle Max put it: “There’s a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive.” It just turns out that dealing with that is different than we thought.

MICKEY KAUS: “Does Hillary want Al Gore in the race?”

LITTLE DEBBIE VS. THE BEAR: No surprise who won.

SHAREHOLDER ACTIVISM AT GOOGLE:

The custodian of five major public pension funds in New York City will formally request next month that Google take steps to counteract internet censorship in foreign countries with authoritarian government such as China, Egypt and Iran, according to Google’s proxy statement for its annual meeting of stockholders on May 10.

Follow the link for much more.

FIGHTING GLOBAL WARMING WITH PLANKTON:

In an effort to ameliorate the effects of global warming, several groups are working on ventures to grow vast floating fields of plankton intended to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and carry it to the depths of the ocean. It is an idea, debated by experts for years, that still sounds like science fiction — and some scholars think that is where it belongs. . . .

The ship plans to dissolve tons of iron, an essential plankton nutrient, over a 10,000-square-kilometer patch. That’s equivalent to 2.47 million acres (3,861 square miles on land or 2,912 square nautical miles). When the trace iron prompts growth and reproduction of the tiny organism, scientists on the WeatherBird II plan to measure how much carbon dioxide the plankton ingests. The idea is similar to planting forests full of carbon-inhaling trees, but in desolate stretches of ocean. “This is organic gardening, not rocket science,” said Russ George, the chief executive of Planktos, the company behind the WeatherBird II project. “Can it possibly be as easy as we say it is? We’re about to find out.”

Like the dreaded Merkle Cloud, this could be dangerous if overdone. Don’t plunge us into a new ice age, please. (And wouldn’t that be a good plot for a thriller — evil scientist, in cooperation with Hugh Chavez-like tropical dictator, deliberately triggers an ice age!) Just remember, you can never trust Plankton.

THE WACKOS proliferate.

QUOTE OF THE DAY.

HACKING YOUR BODY’S BACTERIA for better health. I think this is a great idea, though i also think they’re still a bit short on science at this point. More research, please.