REMEMBERING THE OPEL MANTA: My high-school friend Jim Williams had one of these. He loved it, but I always thought my VW Rabbit blew it away.

MICHAEL YON NEEDS A BIGGER BOAT:

We have sold all 5,200 signed copies of my new book Moment of Truth in Iraq, but I am making a special trip very soon to the printer to sign 2,000 more. I apologize for the slight delay in shipping. Once I have signed the additional books they will be shipped immediately.

Also, Amazon.com has been sold out, but a couple of large shipments are on their way, and Amazon will have books again soon. Moment of Truth hit #6 on the Amazon Bestseller List and then went out of stock. Bad timing!

It’s great to be back in America, but I got measured today for new body armor and helmet. Won’t be long until I am back over there.

Amazingly, he’s still in the top 50 at Amazon. And here’s a review from J.D. Johannes, who knows a thing or two about independent journalism in Iraq himself. He calls it “the right book at the right time.”

THE GREEN FLASH.

HUFFINGTON POST: Hillary slams Democratic activists. MoveOn is not her friend any more . . . .

UPDATE: A “reverse bitter” — dissing the base in primary season.

MICHAEL BARONE: The Rules Change for Obama. Now he’s being treated like a candidate, not a prodigy. He’s not pleased with the shift . . . . “The normally poised candidate looked irritated and weary.”

He needs to take the advice of Rocky Balboa: “If you know what you’re worth, then go out and get what you’re worth. But you gotta be willing to take the hit, and not pointing fingers saying you ain’t where you are because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that and that ain’t you. You’re better than that!”

Sorry, but the whole Baracky thing just put this in mind . . . .

UPDATE: Clinton pulls ahead of Obama in Gallup national poll.

MARK STEYN: Guns and God? Hell, yes! “Take it from a foreigner: In my experience, Americans are the least ‘bitter’ people in the developed world.”

MICHAEL YOUNG ON Barack Obama and the Iraqis:

That’s why Obama’s comments were so off-putting. He effectively told the Iraqis, once again, that they weren’t worth anything to America. . . .

For as long as American leaders don’t treat Iraqis as important in their own right, the Iraqis will have no incentive to tie their long-term interests to America’s wagon. Should that matter? Both realists and idealists would probably answer in the affirmative. But where does Barack Obama stand? It’s hard to imagine that Iraqis see in him change they can believe in.

Read the whole thing.

SWIMMING POOL SEGREGATION IN BRITAIN.

TYLER COWEN: Why are gun owners so happy?

UPDATE: Further thoughts from TigerHawk.

IN THE MAIL: Michael Klare’s Rising Powers, Shrinking Planet: The New Geopolitics of Energy. Important topic, but judging by who blurbed this book I’m skeptical of the treatment . . . .

BILL ROGGIO has news from Iraq that somehow didn’t get much play.

JULES CRITTENDEN: “Patriots Day may be the least known American holiday, and the day most deserving of our recognition.”

WELL, THIS IS EMBARRASSING:

CNN personality Richard Quest was busted in Central Park early yesterday with some drugs in his pocket, a rope around his neck that was tied to his genitals, and a sex toy in his boot, law-enforcement sources said.

Best line from the story: “It wasn’t immediately clear what the rope was for.” (Via JWF). Really, with this sort of arrest on his record, he might as well just run for Congress. He’ll fit right in!

UPDATE: Ann Althouse suggests some outrage along with the snark, and she’s right:

My first reaction was to laugh at the rope too. (And then to worry that kids might get the idea to experiment with rope and hurt themselves.) But now, I’m outraged that the public humiliation was out of proportion and unrelated to the offense.

It’s not illegal to walk around with a rope tied around you like that. (It was under his clothes, I’m assuming, but even if it wasn’t.) Being in a park after hours is a piddling offense. Don’t police normally just tell you the park is closed and let you walk away? That happened to me and my then-husband once, and we just got in the car and drove away, laughing at the police and saying, mock hippie-style, “The park is closed? You can’t close a park, man.” I’d have been shocked if the police had arrested us and searched us for that.

Good point. On the other hand, according to this report, Quest violated a rule of good sense that most hippies knew — don’t tell the cops you’ve got drugs in your pocket:

The police noticed Mr. Quest at 64th Street and West Drive at about 3:40 a.m., the official said. As he was being escorted out, he volunteered, “I have meth in my pocket,” according to an official briefed on the case. The police searched him and recovered a small amount of methamphetamine in a Ziploc bag.

So had Quest not volunteered that he had methamphetamine on him, he might have gotten precisely the treatment Althouse suggests, simply being “escorted out” of the park. And — assuming this NYT report is correct — why did he do that? Beats me.

POLITICO: Obama’s Secret Weapon: The Media:

The shower of indignation on Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos over the last few days is the clearest evidence yet that the Clintonites are fundamentally correct in their complaint that she has been flying throughout this campaign into a headwind of media favoritism for Obama.

Last fall, when NBC’s Tim Russert hazed Clinton with a bunch of similar questions—a mix of fair and impertinent—he got lots of gripes from Clinton supporters.

But there was nothing like the piling on from journalists rushing to validate the Obama criticisms and denouncing ABC’s performance as journalistically unsound. . . . The difference seems clear: Many journalists are not merely observers but participants in the Obama phenomenon.

It’s that thrill going down their leg. Meanwhile, Jules Crittenden comments: “Correct me if I’m wrong, but ‘gotcha’ suggests there’s something to be got.”

UPDATE: The press considers the left-wing noise machine much more powerful than the one on the right — but, of course, the press wants to be bulldozed by the left, really, so that’s a considerable advantage . . . .

ANOTHER UPDATE: Tom Maguire has some related thoughts.

A NOTE TO PRESS FOLKS RUNNING INTERFERENCE FOR OBAMA: Character Issues Weren’t “Tangential” When the Story Was Bush’s ANG Service. Even when they had to make things up.

And read this piece from Jay Rosen on the anniversary of RatherGate.

MEGAN MCARDLE CRACKS, and shells out for an Amazon Kindle. I saw one at CES, and the screen was quite readable even in a semi-dark bar. I thought of ordering one, but for a while Amazon was so swamped by the demand that the wait for delivery was measured in weeks-to-months. They seem to have caught up now, so I eagerly await her review.

Jim Treacher got one a while back and emailed that he was reading InstaPundit: “It’s kind of an interesting experience. The hyperlinks work, as long as the wireless is turned on and there’s a signal. It’s kind of awkward to navigate, though, since you’re ‘turning pages’ instead of scrolling. There might only be 3 short entries per page. But that’s not so bad. At least I know there’ll always be something to read on it!”

The Kindle could be turned into a wireless web-browser without much trouble, it would seem, if you could get to the right pages. Maybe I should set up a page of links to gmail, hotmail, etc., just for Kindle users!

UPDATE: Treacher emails that the Kindle has a built-in browser: ‘You can navigate text-heavy sites like most blogs pretty well, and G-Mail is doable but a pain in the ass. You have to go to the ‘Experimental’ menu to use it, which is appropriate.”

MICKEY KAUS reports on Jerry Brown’s war on suburbs: “How many thousands in campaign contributions is Brown going to accept from apartment-house developers who are dumbfoundedly ecstatic to find left-wing greenies suddenly on their side. … It’s win-win! “