IN THE MAIL: Michael Walters’ The Shadow Walker. Murder in Ulan Bator.

UNVEILING THE FIRST PRACTICAL JETPACK: Looks a bit large for actual practicality, but maybe it’s progress.

HE COULD BE RIGHT: “The era of carbon craziness is almost over.”

ILYA SOMIN ON GUN RIGHTS, POST-HELLER. (Link is PDF, but the piece isn’t long.)

UPDATE: Heller files a followup lawsuit against DC’s “massive resistance” policy on firearms.

CLAIRE BERLINSKI: Reuters Whitewashes Terrorism in Turkey.

MAPPING DISEASE DATA, collaboratively.

REVIEWING THE REVIEWERS: A roundup of book reviews from all over.

OIL DRILLING: Reid Plan Splits Dems. “Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has split the Democratic front opposed to drilling with a plan that would open new areas for exploration. Reid’s proposal was meant to insulate Senate Democratic candidates from public anger over gas prices. Instead, it has created a divide with liberal colleagues and drawn fire from senior House Democrats.”

AT TAXPROF: The Tax Foundation refutes all eight points of an anti-Obama tax screed that is circulating via the Internet and email.

THE HILL: Reid Plan Splits Dems: “Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has split the Democratic front opposed to drilling with a plan that would open new areas for exploration. Reid’s proposal was meant to insulate Senate Democratic candidates from public anger over gas prices. Instead, it has created a divide with liberal colleagues and drawn fire from senior House Democrats.”

Plus, more problems: Sen. Reid Thwarted On Bundle Of Bills. Reid hasn’t had a good year.

VICTOR DAVIS HANSON: Why Do Europeans Love Obama?

POLLS: Now it’s McCain who’s ahead, though by an insignificant margin.

Yesterday the Gallup Tracking Poll showed Obama ahead by 9 points (49-40). Earlier today (Monday) that dropped to Obama ahead by 8 points (48-40). Both were of registered voters.

Now Gallup/USA Today released a new poll of LIKELY voters, showing a 4 point lead for McCain, his first lead in any major poll since early May.

The switch from registered to likely voters explains most of the difference.

Yet this jumping around does not inspire confidence in Gallup.

I suspect that polling this race is even iffier than polling in general.

IS ANYTHING SACRED?

Israeli newspaper Ma’ariv was lambasted for printing the note that Obama placed in the Western Wall, allegedly stolen by a Yeshiva student. “Notes which are placed in the Western Wall are between the person and his Maker; Heaven forbid that one should read them or use them in any way,” said the Chief Rabbi of the Western Wall. “This sacrilegious action deserves sharp condemnation and represents a desecration of the holy site.”

But according to a statement from Ma’ariv yesterday, the Obama campaign actually leaked the note to reporters before Obama even placed it in the wall. Yediot Aharonot, Israel’s most popular daily, apparently also received a copy of the note in advance but decided not to print it.

Sigh. Read the whole thing.

VIRGIN GALACTIC rolls out Mother Ship.

POLITICAL CLEANSING at Wikipedia. “This is disgraceful behavior on the part of Wikipedia, which is demonstrating bias that errs on the side of laughable. But we should be grateful. This censorship reminds us never to trust anyone.”

JACK LAIL: It’s not the camera, it’s the journalism.

They’re getting a lot of mileage out of an awfully cheap video camera this week, proving his point.

MICHAEL TOTTEN: The Bin Ladens of the Balkans, Part II.

TIGERHAWK: A Short Note on Casualties.

WHAT IS THE ARAB WORLD’S PROBLEM? Lee Smith review’s Ken Pollack’s new book, A Path Out of the Desert: A Grand Strategy for America in the Middle East, and comments:

In recent years, former CIA analyst and Clinton-administration National Security Council staffer Kenneth Pollack has found himself so close to Bush administration Middle East policies—like regime change in Iraq and Gen. David Petraeus’ surge strategy—that it’s hardly surprising he’d now like to put some distance between himself and an unpopular White House. Thus, in A Path out of the Desert: A Grand Strategy for America in the Middle East, Pollack adopts a countermeasure perfected over the last several years by Arab liberals concerned that any association with Bush is likely to lose them respect, if not their freedom or their lives: trash the White House pre-emptively and then restate the general principles of its Middle East policy.

I suspect we’ll see a lot of that in coming years, followed eventually by an “everyone knew this all along” conventional wisdom. On the other hand, it’s not working well enough to prevent lefties from posting angry screeds in the reader review section.

JACK LAIL on hateful comments on newspaper websites.

A CONTROVERSY over whether nuclear explosives are the best way to stop an asteroid. I suspect that the answer is “It depends.” Meanwhile, does NASA really have a “nefarious” agenda of putting nuclear weapons in space? I’ve seen no sign of that.

WELL, THIS MAKES MORE SENSE than that “hated Christians” report, though I suppose the two aren’t mutually inconsistent or anything: Police: Accused shooter hated liberals, expected to be killed.

UPDATE: A rather mean-spirited response at Knoxviews; I respond in the comments.

NO LOVE FOR THE E.U. AMONG THE IRISH:

Almost three-quarters of Irish voters are opposed to a second referendum on the EU’s new reform treaty, a new poll published yesterday (27 July) revealed, dealing a blow to EU leaders’ hopes of rescuing the text. . . . Of those who voiced an opinion, 62% said they would vote no in a second referendum, while 34% said they would back the treaty, which aims to overhaul the Union’s institutions and procedures.

The new figures would mean that, compared to the first run on 12 June, where 53.4% of the Irish rejected the text (EurActiv 13/06/08), the no camp could further increase its lead by 6 percentage points to a commanding 24-point lead in a rerun.

I’d be interested to see how this would poll elsewhere in Europe/

MEASURING PICOMETERS to advance nanotechnology.