POPULAR MECHANICS: 7 Military Tech Winners and Losers Under Gates’s Proposed Defense Budget.

WHY WE NEED TAX SIMPLIFICATION:

1. Even the pros make mistakes. Just ask Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, who admits he failed to pay more than $34,000 in self-employment taxes between 2001 and 2004. Or Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.), chairman of the House tax-writing committee, who neglected to report $75,000 worth of rental income from his Caribbean beach house. Geithner paid the back taxes and interest, but the IRS (which he now oversees) graciously waived the penalties. Rangel simply wrote a check for more than $10,000 in back taxes, and he hasn’t had to pay any penalties, either.

2. Ignorance is no excuse. Geithner used tax software (but admitted the error was his fault). Rangel attributed his unreported foreign-earned income to a “language barrier.” But it doesn’t matter. When you sign a tax return, whether you prepare it yourself or leave the number-crunching to a professional, you are responsible for the accuracy of your return and the consequences if you make a mistake.

But here’s why, under the current system, taxes are for the “little people:”

3. You won’t get off so easy. Most taxpayers who fail to file or pay their taxes on time face stiff penalties and interest charges.

A simpler system wouldn’t draw such a strong distinction between those with “juice” and ordinary folks. Which, of course, is why the folks with the juice like the current system so much.

SO I GUESS THE HONEYMOON’S REALLY OVER: Keith Olbermann goes after Obama. Meet the new boss, Keith. Yada, yada.

AS LAPTOPS GET SMALLER, NETBOOKS GET BIGGER? The Acer Aspire 11.6 inch model. “It’s an inch thick, boasts a LED backlit screen with WXGA resolution, and runs the usual netbook internals like an Intel Atom processor, 160GB HDD and 802.11 b/g WiFi. On top of that there’s Bluetooth, 3G, Dolby Pro Logic Sound and a multicard reader. It’s also got a 8-hour lifespan with a 6 cell 5200mAh battery. Build quality is top-notch for its class, and we’d say Acer’s doing good by the Aspire One name — though they’re messing with any sort of tight definition of ‘netbook’ in the process.”

ANSWERING THE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS: How Long Would it Take Piranhas to Eat a Person?

UNVEILING THE Mercedes S400 hybrid.

ALLENTOWN, PA. TRIES TO stick it to Tea Party marchers.

MARK DAVIS: Trillions of Reasons for a Tea Party.

EFFICIENCY: White House press corps stranded in Istanbul.

PJTV: AlfonZo Rachel on Affirmative Action & Socializing the Big Three.

IN THE MAIL: The Midwife: A Memoir of Birth, Joy, and Hard Times.

CHRIS DODD UPDATE: Lieberman: Dodd Will Eventually Win Re-Election.

Joe Lieberman predicted Tuesday that voters will re-elect his beleaguered fellow Connecticut senator, Christopher Dodd, for the same reasons he attributes to his own comeback victory.

Lieberman said he thinks Dodd, the Senate banking chairman buffeted by controversies about Wall Street bonuses and home mortgages, has enough time until next year’s election to rebound from low approval ratings. . . .Dodd has slipped for several reasons: his role in writing a bill that protected bonuses for executives at bailed-out insurer American International Group Inc.; his initial refusal to release documents about his two controversial mortgages with Countrywide Financial Corp.; and his financing of a vacation cottage in Ireland.

Plus this: Can Dodd’s Challengers Resist Poison Cash?

HOW WILL PRESIDENT OBAMA respond to Somali pirates? “This is a far more important moment for Barack Obama than the news media, judging by the lack of coverage on cable news this morning, believes it to be.”

UPDATE: Crew retakes vessel? This is a preliminary report, but if true it gets Obama off the hook.

MURTHA UPDATE: More on $1 Billion Murtha-Connected Biodefense Facility. “Murtha has been supporting a highly questionable project that has benefited an interlocking network of his political funders and friends in private industry.”

PORKBUSTERS UPDATE: The Hill: Online Hide and Go Seek:

Scores of House members are hiding their earmark requests in obscure corners of their official websites — sticking to the letter of their new rule while shunning its spirit.

The lawmakers are interpreting an ambiguous rule liberally, disclosing their requests as required on their official congressional webpages but avoiding any prominent display. Under the new rule, touted by House Democrats and echoed by President Obama as a move toward a more open system of earmarking, members submitting spending requests for 2010 to the Appropriations Committee are required to create an active link on their webpages giving the details.

But the requirement to create a link allows for great disparity, from Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) down the line to the most junior member of the minority, in how and where those requests are displayed. . . .

Many members, including Majority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and Minority Deputy Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), the highest-ranking Republican to request any earmarks, opted to disclose theirs in press releases, either on their main page or a click away.

The ranking Republican on the Appropriations Committee, Rep. Jerry Lewis (Calif.), could not display his requests any more prominently. They are his leading news item, nearly impossible to miss.

But dozens of members’ requests could be found only by scouring their pages and trolling through any number of different categories, from “Issues” to “Legislation” to “District” to — in at least one case — “Other.” Viewers of these members’ pages would have to click three or more times to get the list of submitted projects, and that is assuming the website visitor knows where to look.

According to Taxpayers for Common Sense, 71 lawmakers, not including those known to have rejected earmarks for at least this year, had failed to establish their links or created links that were simply not findable as of 1 p.m. Tuesday.

Read the whole thing. Transparency!

MICKEY KAUS WARNS of Pentagon personnel bloat.

GALLUP: SUPPORT FOR GUN CONTROL AT HISTORIC LOW. “In Gallup polling conducted prior to last week’s gun massacre at an immigrant center in Binghamton, N.Y., only 29% of Americans said the possession of handguns by private citizens should be banned in the United States. While similar to the 30% recorded in 2007, the latest reading is the smallest percentage favoring a handgun ban since Gallup first polled on this nearly 50 years ago.” Note the graphic.

UPDATE: Gun-control efforts represent “backward thinking.”

HUGH HEWITT FOR THE G.M. BOARD? “As I’ve pointed out in earlier posts, the Obama administration is engaged in national industrial policy far more radical than ever before seen in the United States and, worse yet, with policymakers who seemingly know nothing about cars and, for the most part, don’t even own American cars. So I’d have to say Hugh really is better qualified than anybody Obama’s got making auto policy.”

Well, it’s consistent with the new policy — of which I heartily approve — of putting law professors in charge of practically everything . . . .

ANN ALTHOUSE IN THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE: Barney Frank is all wrong on Scalia’s dissent. “If Frank’s accusations inflamed you, think hard about why Frank chose to portray Scalia the way he did. I suspect Frank would like to soften us up for future judicial nominations.”

ANNOUNCED: A Memphis Tea Party.

WELL, THIS IS ENCOURAGING: Electricity Grid in U.S. Penetrated by Spies. “Cyberspies have penetrated the U.S. electrical grid and left behind software programs that could be used to disrupt the system, according to current and former national-security officials. The spies came from China, Russia and other countries, these officials said, and were believed to be on a mission to navigate the U.S. electrical system and its controls. The intruders haven’t sought to damage the power grid or other key infrastructure, but officials warned they could try during a crisis or war.” Hmm. Maybe I should rethink buying that generator . . . .

PLANS FOR TEA PARTY INFILTRATIONS? “On Fox News Channel’s April 7 ‘Your World,’ host Neil Cavuto reported that the Tax Day tea party protests on April 15 will be ‘infiltrated’ by their political opponents and led by left-wing activist organizations. He specifically named Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN).” Reportedly, they’ll try to make the events look racist or fringe-y. Well, ACORN does that for their own movements, so . . . .

CAMILLE PAGLIA: Obama’s Painful Missteps.

CORY DOCTOROW: Obama DOJ invents radical authoritarian theory to defend Bush administration’s warrantless wiretapping. “I don’t expect the guy to walk on water, but I’d sure like it if he’d stop wallowing in the mud.” Meet the new boss, yada yada.

WIRED: FBI Defends Disruptive Raids on Texas Data Centers. “The FBI on Tuesday defended its raids on at least two data centers in Texas, in which agents carted out equipment and disrupted service to hundreds of businesses. The raids were part of an investigation prompted by complaints from AT&T and Verizon about unpaid bills allegedly owed by some data center customers, according to court records. One data center owner charges that the telecoms are using the FBI to collect debts that should be resolved in civil court. But on Tuesday, an FBI spokesman disputed that charge. . . . The raids are the result of complaints filed by AT&T and Verizon about small VoIP service providers whom the telecoms say owe them money for connectivity services. But instead of focusing the raid on those companies, Faulkner and others say the FBI vacuumed up equipment and data belonging to hundreds of unrelated businesses.”