HMM: Should Yale Lose its Tax Exemption Because of its Opposition to the Solomon Amendment?

I WAS NEVER THAT INTO STARGATE SG-1, but even after the deep discount this seems kind of expensive for a boxed set. Though on a per-hour-of-entertainment basis, I guess it’s pretty cheap. Less than a dollar an hour!

UPDATE: Reader William Hughes writes: “You do realize that Stargate was a 10-year series? A total of 214 episodes… Yes, I’ve seen every episode, and yes, I already have the series on DVD. :)”

ANOTHER UPDATE: Another reader emails:

So, I live in China most of the time, and DVDs are as expensive as they are legal. (Five to ten RMB per DVD depending on quality, quantity, and how much of a sucker they think you are)

I’d expect to pay fifty or sixty bucks for the full-blown SG-1 54 disk package, a bit less than half the price on Amazon. Usually, the US-China price ratio is closer to ten to one than two to one… making this a pretty good deal. The other option in China, sometimes, is one season per disk. The quality is what you’d expect, but if you just want to catch up on story lines, it’s an economical alternative. If you can find it.

Bargain prices there.

TALK RADIO IS the new terrorism. I remember when dissent was the highest form of patriotism! Just a few months ago, in fact . . . .

CITY-SCALE Climate Engineering. Well, dammit, if I can’t have my flying car, I’d at least like a domed city or two. I mean, it’s the 21st Century for crying out loud. . .

BANANA DEMOCRATS.

KATRINA PEARSON invites Janeane Garafolo to a Tea Party.

BAMBOO: The next big cash crop? Given the effort it takes to keep a patch from taking over your entire lawn, it should do well . . . .

HMM: June Federal Receipts: The Dive Continues, As Does Media Near Silence. John Galt was unavailable for comment.

UPDATE: Hmm. “It’s interesting that while the economy was booming under Bush, the MSM kept telling us we were in a recession. Now, when we really are in dire financial straits, the MSM is silent. It’s almost as if they have an agenda or something…”

IT’S NOT JUST ACID REFLUX: There’s also bile reflux.

ROLL CALL: Coleman Concedes: Franken To Be Seated.

SO I MENTIONED ERIC HANUSHEK AND ALFRED LINDETH’S new book on education reform earlier today, and Kathleen Rosko of Princeton Press emails that it was already cited by the Supreme Court last week in the Horne case. That never happened with any of my books.

A 30-MINUTE RECIPE FOR Mahi Mahi with Greek-style dressing.

AL FRANKEN DECLARED WINNER in Minnesota.

DUMB IDEA OF THE WEEK: Swine Flu parties.

RALPH PETERS: Bye Bye Babylon: Exiting Iraq’s Cities Victorious.

THE CHEVY VOLT: Intended to be a sportier alternative to the Prius and Insight?

Plus, inflatable-car skepticism.

IN RESPONSE TO THE EARLIER RON PAUL POST (with cool photo!) Jason Whitworth writes: “Would you please point out that if Ron Paul succeeds in disbanding the Fed, that Nancy Pelosi would be in charge of monetary policy. Putting monetary policy back into the hands of the politicians at this time would be economic Armageddon. I sympathize with Libertarians. They are right about out-of-control spending. But like most economic populists, they are misguided and chasing after the wrong target. Please warn them. Or have Megan McArdle or some authoritative economists point out their folly.”

Well, that was the argument for making the Fed unaccountable — and one criticism of Bernanke is that he’s too responsive to the politicians. But I think (Paulites help me out here) that Ron Paul would address this by putting us on the gold standard, so that the money supply wouldn’t be under the control of politicians at all.

UPDATE: A hedge-fund reader (not, I believe, a Paulite) writes: “The stated Paulian goal is to end the current de facto political control of money, which uses the Fed as a beard, and return us to a gold standard. The illusion of Fed independence is hopelessly compromised now, an ironic outcome that has to rank among Ben Bernanke’s worst fears.”

Various readers protest the unworkability of a gold standard, a view with which I tend to agree. But the question is, is the Fed in its current state any more workable? Its success has depended on trust in the independence of institutions and people in the face of political pressurs, a trust that now seems hard to muster.

DAN RIEHL: Re-visiting The Tea Party Movement. “I noted yesterday how any real change in politics must come from the ground up; the Tea Party movement is exactly that type of effort. And America hasn’t seen one that wasn’t primarily candidate driven in decades.”

HIGH TECH INFANTRY: Testing “Land Warrior” in Afghanistan.

WHO’S HOT AND WHO’S NOT: Men agree with men more than women agree with women.

AMY ALKON: Type Dirty To Me.

BROWN SHOOTS: Gloomy U.S. consumers clip housing recovery hopes. “U.S. consumer confidence took an unexpectedly steep slide in June, figures released on Tuesday showed, suggesting the 18-month-long recession had yet to loosen its grip on the economy.” Plus, Stocks Slump As Quarter Ends.

THE LATEST CARNIVAL OF SPACE is up!

AND NOW FOR SOME REALLY IMPORTANT NEWS: Cell-Phone Makers Settle on One-Size-Fits-All Charger. Thanks to reader Hastings Walton for the tip. And about time!

THE TOP FIVE Billy Mays informercial products.