THE TELEGRAPH: President Barack Obama is beginning to look out of his depth. “Barack Obama is an eloquent, brainy and likeable man with a fascinating biography. He is not George Bush. Those are great qualities. But they are not enough to lead America, let alone the world.”

BACKGROUND ON ACORN from the New York Post.

“SMART DIPLOMACY:” Hey, let’s shoot down Israeli jets if they fly over Iraq to attack Iran.

A BUNCH OF interesting food links. I’m surprised to see beer-tap systems included. But then, beer is a food.

STEPHEN GREEN: Deconstructing Dave.

THE IMPORTANCE OF more marketing.

BREITBART’S NEXT SCOOP: The pregame show.

CHANGE: Barack Obama ready to slash US nuclear arsenal: Pentagon told to map out radical cuts as president prepares to chair UN talks.

UPDATE: In Afghanistan, does Obama think we’re like the Soviets?

PAYOFF: Obama Open To Newspaper Bailout Bill.

NICK GILLESPIE: Those Who Do Not Remember History Are Condemned to Say That “Taking Our Country Back” is a Code Word For Racial Animus.

MICHAEL BARONE: Stifling Dissent. And I remember when protest was patriotic!

ANN ALTHOUSE DECONSTRUCTS FRANK RICH:

I wonder why Frank Rich wanted to evoke Free Speech case law when his aim in this column is to bemoan vigorous speech. I suppose he just meant that neither “You lie” in the House chamber or “Fire” in a crowded theater is good. Except that “fire” is good when there is a fire, which leaves Rich’s analogy setting up the argument that shouting “You lie” during a presidential speech is desirable if the President really is lying. But that’s absurd. We’d never get to the end of these already seemingly endless orations if that was the rule.

Plus this:

Not every impolite outburst equals uncontrolled anger, and I don’t remember Rich caring about all the angry statements that were aimed at George Bush. I remember him making them. He and lots of other brave dissenters loved calling Bush a liar. I don’t remember back then hearing anybody propounding the theory that free speech needed to be tempered lest it give “permission to crazy people.”

Me neither.

PJM POLITICAL: From Mighty ACORN, Grows Big Government.com.

“PITCHFORK POLITICS” EFFORTS encounter some blowback.

UPDATE: Reason 1,889,795 why I love the Internet.

MORE COWBELL. Heh. I wish there were a sticker version.

UPDATE: And now there is! Ask, and ye shall receive!

THE DEVIL WEARS Pravda?

CALIFORNIA UPDATE: Going Broke: State’s a wreck – can it be fixed? “It’s been a mess for much of the past three decades because the combination of an out-of date tax system, reckless spending and fickle voters has made state government extremely vulnerable to the ebbs and flows of the economy.” Mostly the “reckless spending,” though I predict that’s the least likely problem to be addressed.

RETRO-FUN: The joy of Spirograph.

TEA PARTY OR THIRD PARTY? I talk to Roger Stone about whether the Tea Party movement will lead to a third party.

BOSTON GLOBE: Cash For Clunkers a “complete waste of taxpayer money.”

MICKEY KAUS: “Andrew Breitbart of BigGovernment.com has stopped being subtle about hinting he has another scoop on order for next week. It’s apparently not another ACORN story. . . . I didn’t realize he’d have the course of events all planned out like Hari Seldon in Foundation.”

OBAMA: ACORN scandals? There are ACORN scandals? “I didn’t even know that ACORN was getting a whole lot of federal money.”

UPDATE: Reader Paul Jackson writes:

Let me be the first, and only probably, to liken Obama’s not knowing that ACORN receives a “whole lot” of federal money, to George H.W. Bush not knowing what a UPC scanner was. I realize he’s got a “whole lot” on his plate, but jeez don’t you think he should have expected an ACORN question or two. Also reminds me of the “above my pay scale” answer regarding when life begins. Now that he’s president, some of these issues just don’t have room in the Obama hard-drive anymore. Maybe if he wasn’t going on 5 Sunday shows, and Letterman, and chairing that UN thing, he might be a little more well versed in wtf is going on.

Dem or Rep, nothing looks stupider than the president not being “up” on current events.

Indeed. Plus, TigerHawk comments:

In a “meaning of ‘is’ is” moment, President Obama asks us to believe that he “didn’t even know that ACORN was getting a whole lot of federal money.” No doubt he also did not know that ACORN was getting a wad of moola, a tin of lucre, a dollop of dough, bread to come and go on, a whole lot of benjamins, or a goodly pile of legal tender. But he apparently did know — we only know this because of his absurd parsing — that the federal government was funding ACORN to some degree.

The president really needs to speak less legalistically in ordinary conversation, because people do not like people who sound like lawyers. Learn not thy lessons from Bill Clinton, Mr. President!

Indeed.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Various readers point out that the problem with the Bush scanner story is that, unlike the report of Obama’s self-proclaimed ignorance of ACORN, the Bush scanner story isn’t true.

GOING “The Full Ginsburg.”

GENE RODDENBERRY’S MACINTOSH PLUS — Serial Number 0001 — is for sale.

CALLING FOR an independent prosecutor for ACORN. “ACORN’s close ties to the progressive movement and Democratic Party mean that there will be little public confidence if Holder decides not to pursue an ambitious investigation and ultimately prosecute. . . . Holder has compounded these concerns with two recent decisions. In New Mexico, federal attorneys apparently recommended high-level prosecutions in the pay-for-play scandal swirling around Gov. Bill Richardson. Holder’s office overrode them and dropped the case. Holder also decided to drop the voter intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party in Philadelphia, where thugs were caught on tape brandishing clubs outside a voting precinct. In both cases, Holder has refused to explain his actions.”