GLAD I ALREADY BOUGHT MINE: Not enough hybrid cars to meet demand.

THAT WOULD BE NICE: Doing something constructive about oil prices.

QUOTAS, OR “ANTI-ASIAN BIAS”?

A complaint by an Asian American student that racial bias blocked his admission to Princeton University has been expanded by the U.S. Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights into a broader “compliance review” of the issues involved beyond his case.

The complaint, filed in 2006, has been viewed as significant by critics of affirmative action who argue — as does the rejected applicant — that highly competitive colleges’ commitment to diversity results in differential standards for members of different groups, with Asian American applicants held to tougher standards. . . . Many guidance counselors at high schools with many top Asian American students report that their Asian American applicants appear to need significantly higher SAT scores or grades to win admission to highly competitive colleges than do members of other ethnic or racial groups.

Read the whole thing.

WHICH WAYS TO advanced nanotechnology?

Related item here.

VITAMIN D UPDATE: “Low levels of vitamin D appear to be associated with higher risk of myocardial infarction (heart attack) in men, according to a report in the June 9 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. Studies have shown that the rates of cardiovascular disease-related deaths are increased at higher latitudes and during the winter months and are lower at high altitudes, according to background information in the article. “This pattern is consistent with an adverse effect of hypovitaminosis D [vitamin D deficiency], which is more prevalent at higher latitudes, during the winter and at lower altitudes,” the authors write. While other explanations are possible, vitamin D has been shown to affect the body in ways that may influence the risk of heart attack or heart disease.”

Basically, you need to be sitting in the sun, drinking red wine, and eating fish. Which, come to think of it, is pretty much the Mediterranean diet.

TIM NOAH: Why Jim Webb would make a terrible running mate.

UPDATE: Politico: Webb’s rebel roots: An affinity for Confederacy. “Webb, a descendant of Confederate officers, also voiced sympathy for the notion of state sovereignty as it was understood in the early 1860s, and seemed to suggest that states were justified in trying to secede.”

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader David King emails: “Those who are inclined to make an issue of this should be the first to understand Webb’s position perfectly: He supports the (Confederate) troops, even though he is against the (Civil) war.”

Plus this: “In a complex world, one can simultaneously admire Robert E. Lee’s character, J.E.B. Stuart’s generalship, and the courage of those who charged up Little Round Top while damning the institution of slavery.”

OVER AT SLASHDOT, they’re taking Dennis Kucinich seriously with regard to his plans to impeach Bush. I think those plans are likely to do as well as his ban on orbital mind-control rays.

THIS HAS TO BE CAUSING HEARTBURN IN THE OBAMA CAMP:

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Democratic Rep. Dan Boren of Oklahoma said Tuesday Barack Obama is “the most liberal senator” in Congress and he has no intention of endorsing him for the White House.

(VIa Jonathan Martin).

IN CANADA, a “breathtakingly broad prohibition” on speech.

PHOTO NEWS: There’s a photo tab at the top of the page now. It takes you to all of these photos.

WELL, DUH: Frequent sex is good for your marriage.

And even better for selling books! “Book projects and PR will go on and on, even if sex does not.”

IRAQI BODYBUILDERS. Cool. Photo gallery here.

IF YOU VOTE FOR ME, I might win a weekend at Blackwater for firearms training.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: “Bikinis and other sexy stimuli can make men more prone to seek immediate gratification – leading to blown diets, budgets and bank accounts, new research suggests. . . . When the men felt well-off, the bikinis lost their influence. But if they considered themselves among the have-nots, they were likely to seek immediate gratification after seeing women running in bikinis.”

YOUSSEF IBRAHIM: Mainstream Media Picking on Bloggers… Again. Yeah, but once they’re laid off, they become bloggers themselves. . . .

A SMALL CONCERN:

The scientists said periods of inactivity are normal for the sun, but this period has gone on longer than usual.

“It continues to be dead,” said Saku Tsuneta with the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, program manager for the Hinode solar mission. “That’s a small concern, a very small concern.” . . .

The last cycle reached its peak in 2001 and is believed to be just ending now, Longcope said. The next cycle is just beginning and is expected to reach its peak sometime around 2012. Today’s sun, however, is as inactive as it was two years ago, and scientists aren’t sure why.

“It’s a dead face,” Tsuneta said of the sun’s appearance.

Let’s hope that Fallen Angels — the Larry Niven / Jerry Pournelle / Michael Flynn novel in which anthropogenic global warming is real, but turns out to have been masking the return of an ice age until CO₂ emissions get cut — doesn’t turn out to be prophetic . . . .

FORECLOSURE FAVORITISM QUESTIONS for Washington Mutual. It must be nice being a member of Congress. Suddenly, everyone loves you and wants to help.

CAFEPRESS looks silly. And Michael Silence comments: “Tam must have missed the memo that you can’t use satire and parody in the 2008 presidential race.”

OBAMA “COCKY?” THIS SORT OF LANGUAGE IS ACTUALLY TYPICAL for members of Congress addressing Cabinet officials. It is seldom received in the spirit in which it is written.

OPEN GUN CARRY: Surprisingly uncontroversial: “Now Jensen carries his Glock 23 openly into his bank, restaurants and shopping centers. He wore the gun to a Ron Paul rally. He and his wife, Clachelle, drop off their 5-year-old at elementary school with pistols dangling from their hip holsters, and they have never received a complaint or a wary look.” And getting surprisingly sympathetic treatment in the Chicago Tribune.

THE WEATHER IS HOT — proof of global warming! — and here’s some useful advice on heatstroke and heat exhaustion:

Athletic researchers say one of the most frustrating aspects of heat illness is that the sufferer is often completely unaware of his or her own symptoms.

“Your cognitive ability and your capacity to make a rational decision is indeed compromised,’’ said Michael F. Bergeron, director of the environmental physiology laboratory at the Medical College of Georgia. “You hear all the time that the athletes themselves didn’t know enough to stop and didn’t want to stop and have no memory of what happened.’’

I had heat stroke once, and I felt absolutely fine until suddenly I was nauseous, weak, and on the verge of collapse. So beware, and drink lots of water. And don’t let worrying about having to pee stop you. When you’re exercising in the heat, any time you don’t have to pee you’re probably on the verge of dehydration. . . .

UPDATE: Reader Gregory Oman emails:

Glenn,

Regarding your heat stroke link today: Out here in the West it has been cold and wet all Spring. We had snow today in the mountains. Proof of global warming?

Yes. Everything is proof of global warming.

A RECIPE FOR homemade espresso popsicles. Yum.

SPIKE LEE: The Jesse Jackson of Film?

PROFESSOR MAKES GRAND CONCESSION: “Quiet, corporate, neat and friendly, full of ordinary Americans of all races, the NRA is masculine in feel but has plenty of women about. Cameras are everywhere, of course, and some of the staff eye me a little warily, but basically there’s an open feel to the place. It’s not creepy.”

BILL O’REILLY ENDORSES Bob Zubrin’s flexfuel plan, along with dropping the tariff on Brazilian ethanol. Also, fast-tracking nuclear power plants.