THE HILL: Judd Gregg’s withdrawal jolts Obama. He’s had a tough time with appointments, but at least Gregg paid his taxes. More on the Gregg withdrawal here.

UPDATE: “White House Gobsmacked?” When they pulled the census from Commerce, they made Gregg’s position untenable. Then there’s the stimulus chicanery. Locking Republicans out doesn’t foster bipartisan moves. But, apparently, they didn’t see this coming. Chalk that up to inexperience, I guess.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Ann Althouse: “So who decided to go partisan: Obama or Gregg or both? Doesn’t the stimulus package have to be seen as partisan at this point? The Republicans must define themselves in contrast to it, and the Democrats need to defend it boldly as their own work. We have a 2-party system. That’s a good thing.”

ILYA SOMIN ON The Politics of the Economic Crisis in Russia.

ARE MEN WHO LOSE THEIR JOBS JUST “addicted to success?”

ABC NEWS: D’oh! Caterpillar CEO Contradicts President on Whether Stimulus Will Allow Him to Re-Hire Laid Off Workers.

MICKEY KAUS CALLS FOR NEGATIVE YOUTUBE ADS ON THE STIMULUS:

During the immigration debate of 2007, an emailer suggested that one way readers might influence Congress would be to “go ahead and mash up some negative ads” on the issue and post them on You Tube. Readers responded, and some of the ads were quite good. I think they had an impact–not by swaying public opinion, but by striking fear into heart of legislators by demonstrating what they might face in their reelection campaigns if they voted for the Bush-McCain semi-amnesty bill. The bill died.

It wouldn’t be hard to do the same thing with the anti-welfare-reform provisions in the stimulus bill. Again, the idea would not be to influence the public. The idea would be to directly terrify Democratic legislators worried about their reelections by giving them a taste of how their vote might play. (It helps that many politicians are generally terrified of You Tube and new information technologies that they can’t control.) Obama aide Rahm Emanuel, for one, is known to be sensitive to the political potency of “wedge” issues like welfare and immigration.

“If you build them,” he says, “I will link.” Heck, I might too. (Bumped).

UPDATE: Ask and ye shall receive — Michelle Muccio, via Cafe Hayek. Only complaint — not negative enough!

REASON INTRODUCES the Personal Stimulus Generator.

HEH: Mayor Goodman defends misunderstood Vegas against bully Obama. Personally, I think this item was just an excuse to run the picture.

UPDATE: Andrew Malcolm emails: “Your bald accusation that the reason for my posting on the LV Mayor was the showgirls photo indicates to me and all who know me that you know me really well.” Heh.

HOW A MOUTHGUARD CAN CHANGE YOUR GAME:

While the concept of a jaw alignment effecting athletic performance might sound farfetched (okay, unbelievable) PPM notes it’s been in the literature for decades. Research studies have shown muscular reaction to gross adjustments in the jaw. Some not-so-bad athletes apparently realized the advantage early in life.

“Michael Jordan, the greatest basketball player ever, stuck his tongue out as he was driving for the basket. By sticking his tongue out, he was putting his jaw in that relaxed position. It probably wasn’t done consciously. It was something he just started doing at the age of 12 and it worked for him,” said PPM inventor Dr. Anil Makkar.

Hmm.

THE HILL: Florida Senate poll shows Crist annihilating field.

GEE, DO YOU THINK? California’s Energy Policy is Creating and Sustaining Budget Problems.

MEGAN MCARDLE NOTES THAT IF YOU CRITICIZE OBAMA, you might get called a racist. Yeah, but only by idiots.

INFORMERCIAL WARFARE: Billy Mays Hates Vince Offer.

RETARDING DESERTIFICATION with nanotechnology?

CENSUS BLOWBACK? Via email I hear that Sen. Gregg has withdrawn his name for Commerce Secretary. Gregg says: “I have found that on issues such as the stimulus package and the Census there are irresolvable conflicts for me.”

IN THE HOUSE, Dissension on the stimulus.

THIS IS YOUR CONGRESS on Hope.

THE AUDACITY OF DOING NOTHING:

“Back in the 19th Century, there were a lot of steep crashes, guys got wiped out, and the economy came back quickly.” What’s different now? The government is a lot bigger and more powerful. Rich companies and people can put some of their wealth into lobbying and demand that the government prevent them from getting wiped out (or at least slow the process).

Resisting that pressure would be more audacious than any of our politicians are likely to be. Or even to imagine being . . . .

INDEED: Satellite Collision Highlights Growing Threat.

Years ago, Rob Merges and I advocated a Sindell-style market-share liability scheme, in which nations put money into a debris mitigation and compensation fund in proportion to their contribution to the problem, thus providing an incentive to produce less debris, and a way of compensating those injured by it, given that the provenance of a particular bit of debris is often uncertain. This got some support in the space law literature, but it’s never taken off, and I’m now somewhat less confident in the ability of international bureaucracies to handle such funds competently. But something needs to be done about this problem, beyond the baby steps we’ve seen so far.

Meanwhile, there may be a claim against Russia under the Liability Convention. Liability for collisions among spacecraft is based on fault, though, and it’s not clear whether Russia did anything wrong. Simply leaving a non-functional satellite in orbit probably doesn’t count as negligence.

ANN ALTHOUSE QUESTIONS THE NEW YORK TIMES:

Obama ran on a redistribution of the wealth agenda? So, back when he was campaigning, and his opponents characterized things he said as meaning that he wanted to redistribute the wealth, and his supporters shouted that down as typical right-wing distortion, Obama was really laying the groundwork for claiming that he had won a mandate to redistribute the wealth? Incredible!

Incredible, typical, whatever. Plus, from the comments: “Here’s an idea: why don’t we distribute wealth based on how much each person did to earn it?”

CHRISTOPHER FOUNTAIN: A trillion here, a trillion there. . . . And the news from Europe is grim.

MARK TAPSCOTT: Obama is headed for a one-term presidency. Seems a little early to make that call.

OBAMA SAYS BUILDING SPRAWL STOPS NOW. Well, yeah, given that the economy is killing new construction . . . .

SOME photo fun from Iraq.

SOME THOUGHTS ON THE SINGULARITY, from J. Storrs Hall.

TOYOTA GETS INTERESTED in cellulosic ethanol.