HMM: Clinton’s Senate successor is Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand. Beats Caroline Kennedy or Andrew Cuomo, if so.

UPDATE: Even better than I thought: “Something to admire about Gillibrand. She’s an NRA supporter.”

ANOTHER UPDATE: According to an email from Americans For Prosperity, she’s good on earmarks too!

CONOR CLARKE: Why do 41% oppose Geithner? Because if he were a Republican, the press coverage would ensure it would be 82%?

CIVIL UNREST DUE TO THE FINANCIAL CRISIS: “Governments have so far managed to deflect attention from their role in the crash, their slipshod monitoring, by declaring themselves to be indispensible to the solution. This may save the skins of politicians in wealthier countries who can credibly and expensively try to prop up banks and sickly industries. But it does not work in countries that are heavily indebted, with bloated and exposed financial sectors. There, the irate crowds are already beginning to demand: why hasn’t a single politician resigned? What has happened to ministerial responsibility? Who will investigate government failure?”

Questions worth asking here, too.

UPDATE: Reader Santiago Valenzuela writes:

Third world countries, massively indebted and on the brink of failure, are only now beginning to ask the tough questions of their government. Will Americans wait that long as well? I know there’s a reflexive “Now, that could never happen here” response to questions of that nature, but the reason that reflex exists is because Americans have largely held their governments away from being massively entangled in their economies. That barrier no longer exists. In fact, the opposite does – Americans expect their government to ‘fix’ the problem.

It certainly could happen here. Right now the only people I see who actually say they expect it to are the survival-blogging folks.

UDDERLY ELECTRIFYING: Power from cow manure. Put a plant next to the Capitol . . . .

SAMIZDATA: Support Geert Wilders.

ROLL CALL: Agents Raid Defense Firm with Murtha Ties. “The Johnstown Tribune-Democrat reported Thursday afternoon that Federal Bureau of Investigation and Internal Revenue Service agents raided the offices of Kuchera Defense Systems and Kuchera Industries in Windber, Pa. Murtha has provided millions of dollars worth of earmarks for the company, and company employees have provided tens of thousands of dollars for his campaign.”

JOE KENNEDY versus the Navajos.

THE IDIOSSEY: An epic poem from IowaHawk.

SOUNDS STEAMY: Confessions of a Slow-Cooker Virgin.

Heh. Slow-cooker. Steamy.

UPDATE: Apparently, everybody’s getting steamy today.

WHAT’S HAPPENING TO NEW YORK REAL ESTATE PRICES in the wake of Wall Street’s losses.

GLENN GREENWALD, “HISTRIONIC?” Well, yeah. But I’m not Moriarty, I’m more like Mycroft. “The conclusions of every department are passed to him, and he is the central exchange, the clearinghouse, which makes out the balance.” But you can just call me “Mike” . . . .

UPDATE: Yes, the “Mike” is a Heinlein reference. If you haven’t read The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress, well, why not?

HMM: World Grain Demand Could Surge With Failed China Crop. Plus, another human death from bird flu in China.

Is it just me, or is this feeling more and more like a John Ringo story? Ugh.

DANIEL DREZNER: Foreign policy implications of the inaugural address.

YOU DON’T SAY: Legal Issues Complicate Gitmo Closing.

WHAT’S NEW in the exciting world of refrigerator magnets. You’ll never guess . . . .

TYLER COWEN: Don’t Nationalize the Banks — Yet.

From The Atlantic’s new Business Blog.

SOMETHING ELSE TO WORRY ABOUT: Severe Space Weather:

Did you know a solar flare can make your toilet stop working?

That’s the surprising conclusion of a NASA-funded study by the National Academy of Sciences entitled Severe Space Weather Events—Understanding Societal and Economic Impacts. In the 132-page report, experts detailed what might happen to our modern, high-tech society in the event of a “super solar flare” followed by an extreme geomagnetic storm. They found that almost nothing is immune from space weather—not even the water in your bathroom.

The problem begins with the electric power grid. “Electric power is modern society’s cornerstone technology on which virtually all other infrastructures and services depend,” the report notes. Yet it is particularly vulnerable to bad space weather. Ground currents induced during geomagnetic storms can actually melt the copper windings of transformers at the heart of many power distribution systems. Sprawling power lines act like antennas, picking up the currents and spreading the problem over a wide area. The most famous geomagnetic power outage happened during a space storm in March 1989 when six million people in Quebec lost power for 9 hours.

Grids are apparently more vulnerable. This is basically like an EMP attack from nature; systems should be hardened up against both, in my opinion, and made more resilient in the event of failure. I’ve had some thoughts on that in the past. If they’re looking for a place to spend “stimulus” money, this kind of system-hardening would at least make more sense than the outright pork that will probably wind up getting the cash.

STEVE CHAPMAN: “We all know how we got into this economic mess. We spent too much, borrowed with abandon, and acted like the bills would never come due. So what’s the prescription for getting out? Spending more, borrowing more, and acting like the bills will never come due.”

Yeah, that’ll work.

MAURICE STUCKE AND ALAN GRUNES: Toward a Better Competition Policy for the Media: The Challenge of Developing Antitrust Policies that Support the Media Sector’s Unique Role in Our Democracy.

MORE ON THE INAUGURAL TICKET SNAFU: “On the day after Barack Obama became the 44th president of the United States, members of Congress were flooded with complaints from people who just missed the chance to see history made. . . . As Feinstein’s statement suggested, the biggest problem on Inauguration Day came at the purple gate — an Inauguration entrance near First Street and Constitution Avenue Northwest that’s given birth to a Facebook group called ‘Survivors of the Purple Tunnel of Doom.'”

The Inaugural Committee said it based its preparations on “historical precedent” — but all we heard for months was that there would be “unprecedented crowds.” So it shouldn’t have been a surprise. And it’s not as if the crowds were that unprecedented in actuality — had Adrian Fenty’s 5 million materialized, there might have been an excuse, but by all evidence the crowd size was maybe one-fifth that big, and within historical levels.

Hope these guys do a better job on the economy and the war . . . .

POLITICO: What We Don’t Know About Obama.

ORAL ANTICANCER THERAPY through nanotechnology.

DICK MORRIS, NOT FEELING THE HOPE AND CHANGE: Here Comes Socialism.

OOPS: Gelling biodiesel causes Minnesota school closings. At low temperatures, biodiesel basically becomes Crisco . . . .

UPDATE: Some of the comments say that the biodiesel here was blended with the wrong grade of diesel for the temperatures.

FREEDOM POLITICS is a new website devoted to, well, you know.