HAND SANITIZER, FLU, and frontiers in germicidal living.

UNVEILING the new and improved BlogCritics site.

WHAT NANCY PELOSI doesn’t remember anymore.

SWINE-FLU SKEPTICISM from Aziz Poonawalla.

UPDATE: Galvanizing the public with Swine Flu public-service announcements — from 1976. You know, it’s feeling more and more like we’re living in a lame ’70s do-over all the time . . . .

THE NEXT WHITE HOUSE PHOTO OP. Heh. Plus this.

I THINK I FORGOT TO MENTION THIS BEFORE, but congratulations to the Arizona Desert Lamp, winner of the AFF college blogging contest.

A TODDLER, AN OPEN WINDOW, and an amazing catch.

GUNS AND HOSES: More on Pirates.

INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY: Nancy “Scooter” Pelosi.

“100 DAYS OF DISASTER:” THE ST. LOUIS TEA PARTY COALITION IS observing the end of Obama’s first 100 days today tomorrow.

UPDATE: Related thoughts from Michele Bachmann.

AT THE VOLOKH CONSPIRACY: Ireland v. United Kingdom and the prosecution of Bush officials. Plus, More Thoughts on the Legal Barriers to a Torture Prosecution. I think there will be fewer barriers to TARP misconduct prosecutions . . . .

NEW YORK POST ON THAT PHOTO-OP FLYOVER: “Plane Dumb.”

STAYING CALM: “Tennessee health officials expect to find cases of swine flu in the state in coming days, but they see no cause for alarm and say prevention and treatment are the same as for seasonal flu.” Plus, keeping an eye on long-haul truckers’ health, and the importance of washing your hands frequently or using hand sanitizer. That last can’t be stressed enough.

ANDY MCCARTHY ON ERIC HOLDER: I told you so.

LARRY KUDLOW: Geithner: The Fox Guarding the Henhouse? “What is going on in this country? The government is about to take over GM in a plan that completely screws private bondholders and favors the unions. Get this: The GM bondholders own $27 billion and they’re getting 10 percent of the common stock in an expected exchange. And the UAW owns $10 billion of the bonds and they’re getting 40 percent of the stock. Huh? Did I miss something here? And Uncle Sam will have a controlling share of the stock with something close to 50 percent ownership. And no bankruptcy judge. So this is a political restructuring run by the White House, not a rule-of-law bankruptcy-court reorganization. . . . With Geithner running the Treasury and the potentially criminal enterprise called TARP, is his incestuous relationship with Wall Street bigwigs a perfect example of the fox guarding the henhouse? Was he too cozy to keep a critical eye on the very institutions that blew up later?” I think I’ll invest in China, where they respect private property . . . .

BUSTING BANK OF AMERICA: “The cavalier use of brute government force has become routine, but the emerging story of how Hank Paulson and Ben Bernanke forced CEO Ken Lewis to blow up Bank of America is still shocking. It’s a case study in the ways that panicky regulators have so often botched the bailout and made the financial crisis worse.” As I’ve said before, I’m surprised that we haven’t seen shareholder suits already.

RATTNER UPDATE: “The White House is standing behind its auto industry adviser whose company is accused of paying more than $1 million to win a lucrative deal with the New York state pension fund.”

CHUCK SHUMER CALLS PANDEMIC FLU FUNDING A “porky little thing.” Well, then. Plus, a cautionary note on efforts to make political hay out of flu, at DailyKos.

TORTURE: Pelosi becomes the story? “Minority Leader John Boehner is asking the Obama administration to release the CIA’s notes briefing Nancy Pelosi. Whether the Obama team does so or not seems irrelevant. It is enough for the public now to know that Pelosi and others were briefed and that no meaningful objections and steps to halt the CIA (e.g. cutting off funding) were ever raised. The GOP, with moves like this and in interviews such as the one Sen. Kit Bond gave today, is trying to make Pelosi the story now.”

VIDEO: Air Force One panic in New York. Plus strikingly parallel photos. (See the comments at YouTube). The country’s in the very best of hands . . . .

CQ POLITICS: Will Murtha Scrutiny Lead Anywhere?

The watchdog groups are following up on the investigation surrounding the PMA Group and, reportedly, three key lawmakers closely tied to it — Reps. John P. Murtha, D-Pa., Peter J. Visclosky, D-Ind., and James P. Moran, D-Va.. . . . Interestingly, under House rules that were in existence until 1997, the outside groups could have filed an actual complaint with the ethics panel itself.

That complaint would have required action of some form — even a cursory investigation before dismissal. But the rules changed in 1997.

Under a change that was adopted that year, outside groups and private citizens were barred from actually filing complaints with the ethics committee. Now, only individual members of the House of Representatives can file a complaint with the Ethics Committee against a fellow member.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out the result: The number of complaints (and, therefore, the number of investigations) dropped substantially.

And who was the mastermind who pushed through the change, so that outside groups and private citizens could no longer file complaints with the House Ethics Committee?

Why, none other than Murtha himself.

It’s like he knew what was coming . . . .

TARP: The Looming Debacle.

A PANDEMIC PREPAREDNESS fingerpointing roundup. The more they do this, the more I figure they’re hiding something. That’s certainly how it worked with Fannie Mae . . . .

UPDATE: A reader writes:

How about a simpler explanation? Did you notice the AP story today on how the Democrats in Congress have agreed to push through Obamacare on a “reconciliation” basis that would severely limit debate and prevent filibuster? No? Probably no one else did, either, what with the sixteen above the fold stories about the Pink Death now kinda sort maybe sweeping the globe.

It is certainly consistent with the Obama modus operandi to spread much FUD just before rolling out some huge government expansion. Recall the grim economic rumor-mongering before Stimulusaurus.

You think?

WATCHING KUDLOW TONIGHT, I saw he thinks that many of the bailout shenanigans involve potential 10b-5 violations, as well as wire and mail fraud issues. That seems likely. I’m wondering why there aren’t more lawsuits. It’s not as if there isn’t plenty of money on the table . . . .

COOL AND DETACHED: “US reaction to swine flu more muted than elsewhere. U.S. airports and border agents waved people through Monday with little or no additional screening for Mexico’s deadly swine flu—a far more muted reaction than the extreme caution elsewhere around the world.”