A.C. KLEINHEIDER: Superdelegate Bredesen leaning toward Clinton?

UPDATE: Michael Silence observes: “Bredesen is a pragmatist. He’ll go with Clinton.”

PORKBUSTERS UPDATE: Friends of the earmark make themselves heard:

The hottest document on Capitol Hill is an anonymous six-page white paper that defends, of all things, earmarks — those much-maligned home-state projects that lawmakers shoehorn into spending bills.

Doesn’t it say a lot that they’re afraid to make themselves heard, except . . . anyonymously?

A growing number of politicians have decided to just say no to earmarks. Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, has vowed to veto any legislation that contains “pork-barrel spending.” And several Democrats, including Rep. Henry Waxman (Calif.), have promised not to request earmarks anymore.

The trend worries many lobbyists (and some lawmakers), and they are beginning to fight back — in other words, to lobby. Although a publicist initially told the Washington Post otherwise, the Ferguson Group acknowledges that it helped persuade three mayors whose cities it represents to praise earmarks in a Post op-ed Saturday.

But the widely read white paper — “The Fairness of Congressional Earmarking in American Democracy” — is the biggest counterattack so far. The only question: Who wrote it?

My guess was that it was written by some lapper-at-the-public-trough, and sure enough, it turns out I’m right.

UPDATE: Reader John Schwab makes an excellent point:

I think you should be clearer in your response to that white paper. it’s a straw man – I don’t know of anyone who would say that earmarks can serve no purpose whatsoever. It’s out-of-control anonymous earmarks that must be eliminated, especially those that double back to benefit a congressman’s family. Indeed, if earmark abuse is not addressed Congress may lose the power to use earmarks that make sense.

Don’t let them re-frame the debate. If an earmark is such a good idea why won’t they take credit for authoring it?

Heck, they won’t even put their names on the memos defending them.

MEGAN MCARDLE ON PLAGIARISM:

Avoiding minor plagiarism is an occupational hazard of writing. There are only so many ways to say “Trichet told a press conference that monetary policy would continue to be tight for the rest of the year”; if you weren’t at the press conference, you’re going to end up using some close variant on a phrase that probably appeared in half the copy filed about it. To whom do you attribute it, if anyone?

This, however, is not minor, and also, not hard to avoid. I’ve very much enjoyed some of Joseph James Twitchell’s work, and now it’s clear why; he stole large chunks of it from some of my favorite writers, like Virginia Postrel and Grant McCracken.

Some lengthy thoughts of mine on plagiarism, from The Appearance of Impropriety, can be found here.

SO FIX ‘EM: Deplorable conditions at Fort Bragg.

ATHEISM AND SCIENCE: A debate between David Berlinski and John Derbyshire.

HERE COME THOSE SANTA ANA WINDS AGAIN: Worries about more fires in California.

DEGREE-OLA: “The provost of West Virginia University told deans Sunday that he would resign because of his role in the improper awarding of a master’s degree to the governor’s daughter.”

REVIEWING THE REVIEWERS: A roundup of book reviews from this weekend’s newspapers.

JENNIFER RUBIN: McCain’s soft offensive against Obama:

While Obama was fending off stories about his flag pin and his wife’s comment that she had never been proud of America, McCain was reveling in nostalgia over his family’s military service and the sacrifices he made in service of “a cause greater than [himself].”

While Obama deals with question after question about his spotlight-dwelling mentor Reverend Wright, McCain introduced us to his salt-of-the-earth English teacher who, McCain says, influenced his character and values. The implicit message is that the other guy has Wright’s invective and McCain has Mr. Ravenel’s honor code.

As Obama suffered defeat in Pennsylvania, losing many rural areas by thirty points, where was McCain? In Inez, Kentucky, extolling the virtues of coal miners, and discussing Obama’s “bitter” comments in front of a cheering crowd heavy with religious, gun owners.

The tours may be the best solution for the dilemma that plagues the McCain campaign: they desperately want to refight the culture wars but have a candidate who doesn’t want to get his hands dirty. The tours provide him with venue after venue to make the arguments about character and values which will form a key portion of his campaign message.

And while it gets McCain plenty of local TV in key areas, it keeps his national-media profile low so as not to distract from the Democrats’ self-inflicted wounds.

WHERE THE BOSTON GLOBE SEES Hillary Strangelove, I see someone who just might be the most uncompromising wartime President in U.S. history. And the L.A. Times wonders if the Globe really means it: “If Clinton ends up the Democratic nominee, will the leading journalistic voice in one of the nation’s most liberal states endorse Republican John McCain?” That’s looking more possible, so let’s keep an eye on this question. It’ll certainly be awkward for them . . . .

THOUGHTS ON THE FLAG PIN: “If John McCain wore a confederate flag lapel pin, very few of these people would be saying ‘it’s just a lapel pin.'”

GEE, I WONDER WHY? Obama dread turns to glee for the GOP.

I GUESS IT’S A GOOD THING IT WAS BLOWN UP, THEN: Syrian site could have produced fuel for 2 weapons.

JOHN FUND ON THE SUPREME COURT AND VOTER FRAUD: We had a podcast interview with Fund on this topic a while back; it’s here.

HEH. The biter, bit. “It seems that white feminists and Leftists are a big bunch of racists, too. . . . White Privilege was to blame… No wonder Amanda Marcotte thinks Free Will is overrated.” Yeah, I linked to Goldstein on the general topic, but this was worth a link of its own.

JOE KATZMAN: Straining Belief: The Obama Campaign and Michelle’s UCLA Speech.

THEY TOLD ME THAT IF GEORGE W. BUSH WERE RE-ELECTED, famous scientists would be punished for daring to dissent from politico-religious orthodoxy. And they were right!

AT TALKLEFT, A REZKO UPDATE: “A former associate of Tony Rezko’s testified at his trial today that Rezko told him U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald would be replaced and the investigation into his conduct would end. . . . The Sun Times also reports that the Judge and lawyers have been working hard to keep Barack Obama’s name from surfacing in the trial.” The good news for Obama: Jeremiah Wright is diverting all the attention to himself, and away from Rezko!

WHEN RADICAL MUSLIMS become moderate.

WELCOME TO the party, Andrew.

BEING PRESIDENT: Not all it’s quacked up to be.

WELL, I DO TRY. It’s nice to see some law professors notice, and even point out that this isn’t as easy as it looks.

TAKING “VIRAL MARKETING” A BIT TOO LITERALLY: I’ve been getting emails from all sorts of people about a site called “Reunion.com.” Turns out they didn’t send them. Reunion.com did, after perusing their address books:

As part of the process, she submitted her name, gender, e-mail address, birth date and ZIP Code.

Then Schmidt came to a page saying that “we’ll find your friends and family who are already members and also automatically invite any nonmembers to join (it’s free!).” It instructed her to enter the password for her Yahoo e-mail account.

“I thought I was just signing up to read my friend’s message,” Schmidt said. “At no time did I think I was authorizing them to access my online address book.”

Within minutes, though, she started getting e-mails from friends and colleagues asking why she was searching for them on Reunion.com.

As the day progressed, Schmidt realized that every one of the roughly 250 personal and professional contacts in her online address book had received an e-mail, ostensibly from her, saying that she was searching for them and encouraging them to join her at Reunion.com.

“I had to send an e-mail to everyone apologizing for what happened,” she said.

Sounds quite cheesy. I don’t respond to any of these social-network invitations, but I’m certainly glad I didn’t respond to this one.

RAND SIMBERG: “What the Clintons did for feminism, could Obama do for race relations?”

UPDATE: Obama’s damage-control efforts seem too little, too late. “The Illinois senator spoke at a hastily arranged press conference on the airport tarmac in Wilmington, N.C., as media traveling with him were about to board his campaign plane. Airplane engines roared in the background and a plane taking off interrupted the brief media availability, which lasted less than six minutes and permitted only three questions.”