YEP: You’ve Been Punked By Obama — The Detainee Episode.

THE BRITISH BLOGOSPHERE lands a punch.

UPDATE: I didn’t say it was the first one.

HAPPY EASTER: A bunch of interesting food links. Losing 70 pounds by eating at McDonald’s? “Take that, Morgan Spurlock!”

MORE ON THE MURTHA/PMA EARMARK SCANDAL:

U.S. Reps. Patrick Murphy and Allyson Schwartz were among the first lawmakers in the country to say they would donate to charity $60,000 in campaign contributions related to the now defunct lobbying firm The PMA Group.

There are no plans however, to return $6.6 million in earmarks the two Democrats secured over two years for the companies who hired PMA, or whose corporate parents did. Murphy also requested $5 million for one of the companies in next year’s round of earmarks, which are government grants intended to benefit lawmakers’ home districts.

No lawmakers have been accused of wrongdoing. Yet federal agents raided PMA’s offices as part of an investigation into whether founder Paul Magliocchetti, who has close ties to Johnstown Democratic Rep. John Murtha, arranged illegal straw donations, the Associated Press reported.

Arizona Republican Rep. Jeff Flake has repeatedly called for an ethics investigation into the relationship between earmarks requests and campaign contributions, to no avail.

Too much attention to this stuff might threaten the whole feedlot.

TIGERHAWK: You know the cliche, “it’s not the crime, it’s the cover-up”? Well, there is public relations corollary: “It’s not the blog, it’s the complaining about the blog.”

I made a similar point, less pithily, here.

PIRATE UPDATE: Official: US sea captain freed in swift firefight. About time. But though this may take the current story off the news, it doesn’t really solve the underlying problem.

UPDATE: Related: “Great news, and — yes, I’ll say it — tip o’ the hat to President Obama for signing off on the mission. Now I have two questions. What will we do with the prisoner? Do we believe that this action is sufficient to restore deterrence against piracy?” Indeed.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Dave Kopel congratulates President Obama and the military.

WILL TWITTER REPLACE INSTAPUNDIT? Or is it just a tool to let everyone else catch up? Well, I was hoping to be replaced by a robot, but whatever works.

UPDATE: A comment: “You really can’t mob on twitter.”

ANOTHER UPDATE: Roger Simon weighs in.

WHAT CAN WE LEARN from Japanese education?

IN THE MAIL: Contact With Chaos, from Michael Z. Williamson.

HARTFORD COURANT: Cloud Follows Dodd Into Months Ahead. “Dodd has lost his touch. For three decades he’s held the affection of Connecticut voters. . . . Today, routine questions cause Dodd to stagger and stumble into breathtaking blunders, all his own creations. It began in June when Conde Nast’s Portfolio magazine broke the story of the two favorable mortgages Dodd received from Countrywide Financial. On that Friday afternoon, Dodd’s office issued an angry written denial that he’d ever used his position for personal gain. Dodd, his office said, was traveling and unavailable. . . . That day began the damaging pattern of denial, contradiction and preposterous clarification. The cost of a charmed career in politics may be not knowing how to fight. The whiff of decay fills the air around Dodd.” Ouch.

Plus, Does Dodd look old? Blame it on Hi-def TV. The guy can’t catch a break.

SCOTT KESTERSON is back in Afghanistan.

RAND SIMBERG on attempted sanity regarding guns on campus. And resistance thereto from universities.

MARK STEYN ON THE SOMALI PIRATES: Our Reprimitivized Future. “As it happens, Somali piracy is not a distraction, but a glimpse of the world the day after tomorrow. . . . Half a century back, Somaliland was a couple of sleepy colonies, British and Italian, poor but functioning. Then it became a state, and then a failed state, and now the husk of a nation is a convenient squat from which to make mischief. . . . It’s also a low-risk one. Once upon a time we killed and captured pirates. Today, it’s all more complicated. The attorney general, Eric Holder, has declined to say whether the kidnappers of the American captain will be ‘brought to justice’ by the U.S. ‘I’m not sure exactly what would happen next,’ declares the chief law-enforcement official of the world’s superpower. . . . Meanwhile, the Royal Navy, which over the centuries did more than anyone to rid the civilized world of the menace of piracy, now declines even to risk capturing their Somali successors, having been advised by Her Majesty’s Government that, under the European Human Rights Act, any pirate taken into custody would be entitled to claim refugee status in the United Kingdom and live on welfare for the rest of his life.”

Related: “Ron Howard Yearns for Less Powerful America Not ‘Driven by Militarism’.” I think we’re there.

VIDEO FROM THE “A NEW WAY FORWARD” RALLY IN CHICAGO. Earlier coverage here. Meanwhile, here’s a report from San Francisco. They could only get a hundred people to turn out in San Francisco?

UPDATE: Low turnout explained. “Those on the Left who pay attention to these sorts of things have been instructed not to pay attention – and they’re following their instructions.”

ANOTHER UPDATE: A video report from Austin. Plus reader Neal Atkins reports: “Here’s a video of the Austin ‘protest’. I guess the camera man didn’t have a lens wide enough to get the whole group. There were 4 people speaking and it looks like there might have been about 10 people standing around. Don’t know how many of those were tourists there to see the Capital.” Bonus points to these protesters for complaining about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bonuses, and Obama’s Wall Street donations, though.

MORE: Another report from Austin. There may have been as many as two or three dozen people there according to this report, though it’s hard to know if they were all demonstrators. Video here: “These are good people. They’re not crazy. They’re misguided, but not crazy.”

SURPRISE: Crisis Altering Wall Street as Big Banks Lose Top Talent. “According to the banks and executive recruiters, hundreds of bankers have been jumping to Deutsche Bank and Credit Suisse, neither of which took a government bailout. They see a rare chance to upgrade talent and standing on Wall Street — and globally — by luring top minds who would not have considered moving from a Goldman Sachs or a Morgan Stanley in flush times. Now that their rivals must accept compensation limits and other restrictions that come with the use of taxpayer support, the foreign banks are finding more eager takers.”

UPDATE: Exodus of Top Bankers Bad News for the Taxpayer.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Stuart Wagner writes:

As someone who left a major Wall Street IB (First Boston) to start a private boutique, I believe you will see a larger exodus towards that model rather than for other large investment banks. Small, privately-owned advisory firms that can earn large fees with little capital and far less oversight. We became a major force in M&A and public equity underwritings in our sector with only $8 MM in capital (we sold out to Merrill Lynch in 2006).

We’re going back to the 1920s and the era of partnerships and private capital. Pubic capital markets are over-regulated now and it will get worse. Restricting access to capital is bad for growth, but good for those who are already wealthy because they will get their pick of the best opportunities and earn higher returns.

A lot of “reform” seems to be mostly good for those who are already wealthy.

MORE: Barney Frankonomics.

VOTING MACHINES and “calibration drift.”

JONATHAN TURLEY: The Free World Bars Free Speech. “For years, the Western world has listened aghast to stories out of Iran, Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern nations of citizens being imprisoned or executed for questioning or offending Islam. Even the most seemingly minor infractions elicit draconian punishments. . . . But now an equally troubling trend is developing in the West. Ever since 2006, when Muslims worldwide rioted over newspaper cartoons picturing the prophet Muhammad, Western countries, too, have been prosecuting more individuals for criticizing religion. The ‘Free World,’ it appears, may be losing faith in free speech.” Politicians were never such big fans of free speech anyway, and they’re cowards besides. Goodies go to those they’re afraid of, and right now they’re more afraid of angry Muslims than of free-speech believers.

TOP TEN REASONS TO scrap the tax code in favor of something much simpler. On the other hand, here’s why there’s pressure to keep it: “The Congressmen on the House Ways and Means Committee Received $55,157,458 in the 2008 Election Cycle. . . . If we scrapped the code, the committee members would lose their power to manipulate the code in order to pay off their campaign contributors.” Unless, you know, they worry about losing their seats more than losing the donations.

A TEA PARTY PROTEST IN YAKIMA, WASHINGTON: “Over 500 people rallied