IS THAT GOOD SALESMANSHIP? Comparing Barack Obama to Julius Caesar. So now we know someone who isn’t among the great writers of our time, anyway . . .

MARK STEYN ON TERRORISM: “Two US residents, one an American citizen, one a Canadian citizen, educated and assimilated, and enjoying a nice enough living to be able to afford to fly to Demark to kill a couple of guys over a cartoon. In the long run, Afghan cave-dwellers and Waziristani goatherds are less of a threat than fellows like Messrs Headley and Rana. The company name – ‘First World Immigration Services’ – is a rather droll jest.” This behavior has been empowered and encouraged by the cowardice of enablers at places like Yale University.

A RIGHT TO COUNSEL in civil litigation?

DEMOCRATS SENDING UP WARNING FLARES.

FRANK MUNGER: “Atoms For Peace,” all over again?

JAMES TARANTO: While the President Golfs: Afghanistan, once a necessary war, is downgraded to someone else’s mess. “Hang on a second. It has now been 51 weeks since Obama was elected president, and more than nine months since he took office, and he’s just now getting around to asking the ‘questions . . . that have never been asked’? But that’s not really fair to Obama. After all, he has a busy schedule, what with golf games and pitching the International Olympic Committee and date nights and Democratic fund-raisers and health care and the U.N. Security Council and Sunday morning talk shows and saving the planet from global warming and celebrating the dog’s birthday and defending himself against Fox News and all.”

NEEDING MORE HELICOPTERS IN AFGHANISTAN. Paging Amy Klobuchar!

NOT LIVING UP TO THE DIVERSITY RULEBOOK: Obama And His Good Ol’ Boys.

IRAQPUNDIT ON angry Iraqis.

TERROR UPDATE: Two Chicago Men Charged in Alleged Danish Terror Plot.

HEALTH CARE UPDATE: A new episode of The Senate Doctors’ Show. Is it my imagination, or do they seem to be getting better quality than most YouTube videos? I wonder how?

HOW TO SPEND a weekend in Knoxville.

GALLUP: Libertarians in electorate hit new high.

AT THE HILL, talking about what Dems gain or lose if they tackle healthcare alone.

DAVID CHANG’S favorite cookbooks. Including one by . . . Nathan Myrhvold?

BLASPHEMONOMICS: Plus, from the comments: “The funniest thing is that Levitt’s got Paul Krugman and Al Gore marketing his book for him. Pure genius.”

IS THE HUMAN BODY built for distance? Not mine. . . .

THERE’S NO IQ TEST FOR NEWS-ANCHOR JOBS: “CNN should consider banning its anchors from appearing on ‘Celebrity Jeopardy’ after the humiliating defeats of Wolf Blitzer and Soledad O’Brien.” It’s especially embarrassing to lose to someone from Desperate Housewives. But hey, I know some smart people who didn’t do that well on Jeopardy. . .

BARNEY FRANK TELLS THE TRUTH: “We Are Trying On Every Front To Increase The Role Of Government.” Just in case there was any doubt.

UPDATE: Hiawatha Bray emails with context: “Somebody left off the end of Frank’s remark, and so they left out words that seem to change his meaning considerably. He said, ‘We are trying on every front to increase the role of government in the regulatory area.’ You see the difference?”

GOOD GRIEF: GAO: U.S. News Rankings, Not Accreditation, Key Driver of Law School Tuition.

OUR LOWERED ECONOMIC EXPECTATIONS: “The stock market reaches an old milestone and the unemployment rate is below 10%. In Obama’s America, that’s worthy of celebration.”

RON BAILEY: Using free market rhetoric to expand government power.

THIS SEEMS LIKE NEWS: Geithner Backstairs Intrigue Awarded $13 Billion Directly to Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch (RIP), Société Générale and Deutsche Bank. “While negotiating how much loss large banks would have to take on credit default swaps with the bankrupt insurer AIG, the New York Fed, then under Geithner, rejected a 40 cents-on-the-dollar deal in the works and made taxpayers pay at least $13 billion to ensure the banks suffered no losses.”

UPDATE: Tom Maguire says there’s no story here.

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

BIDEN’S FAVORABLE RATING PLUNGES, and Michael Silence asks, “When did he have one?” Hey, he’s a real man of genius.