SOLAR POWER INCENTIVES: The fine print taketh away.

CHILD SUPPORT and being broke.

POLITICS DAILY: Will Chris Dodd Bail Out His Buddy at Countrywide Financial?

THIS DAY IN HISTORY: “23 years ago today, a provision that was slipped into the Firearms Owners Protection Act banned the transfer of new machine guns to civilians.” A day that will live in infamy!

MICKEY KAUS on “Game Changer” dishonesty at the NYT. “I think my friend is right about the culture of the newsroom–about 45 years ago. As for today, I think he’s living in a dreamworld. Even if the Times had published such a story, Times reporters would certainly not have high-fived the colleague who’d cost Obama the election. Not after two terms of Bush. And I have no faith the paper would even have published it (before allowing the reporter to slink out of the building).”

GAY PATRIOT: Where’s That “Net Spending Cut” That Obama Promised?

SWINE FLU UPDATE: US health officials troubled by new flu pattern.

NEVADA GOVERNOR CRITICIZES OBAMA’S “RECKLESS COMMENTS:”

The cancelled conventions and meetings have cost the Las Vegas economy over $100-million, not including gaming revenue.

“I am disappointed at the hypocrisy shown by this Administration,” Gibbons said, “President Obama is coming to Las Vegas later this month for a political fundraiser, but he will not help the struggling families in Las Vegas and Nevada who are out of work because of his reckless comments.” Governor Gibbons noted, “President Obama is coming to Las Vegas to raise campaign cash for Senator Harry Reid, apparently our money is good enough for the President, but our tourism, jobs, and economic future are not.” Gibbons added, “This is politics, pure and simple, President Obama stood for change, but all he has done is brought negative economic change to Nevada.”

Hmm. I wonder how this will impact Harry Reid’s re-election campaign?

CNN: Poll shows Pelosi with Gingrich-like approval ratings.

STIMULUS! HOUSING STARTS FALL TO RECORD LOWS: “New U.S. housing starts and permits unexpectedly fell to record lows in April, a government report showed on Tuesday, denting hopes that stability in the housing market was imminent. The Commerce Department said housing starts fell 12.8 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 458,000 units, the lowest on records dating back to January 1959, from March’s upwardly revised 525,000 units. . . . New building permits, which give a sense of future home construction, dropped 3.3 percent to 494,000 units, the lowest since records started in January 1960,”

“TOO BIG TO FAIL.” Heh.

WELL, DANG: Sarah Connor Chronicles terminated.

THAT USED TO SOUND BETTER: Obama turning America into California.

HOPE AND CHANGE: Brazil and China eye plan to axe dollar. “Brazil and China will work towards using their own currencies in trade transactions rather than the US dollar, according to Brazil’s central bank and aides to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Brazil’s president. The move follows recent Chinese challenges to the status of the dollar as the world’s leading international currency.” Quite an accomplishment — Obama has been president for just four months, and his legacy already seems secure. . . .

MARK SANFORD TO REPUBLICANS: “Libertarian” isn’t a dirty word. I hope not.

SOAK THE RICH? Lose the rich.

WILL NANCY PELOSI be flying commercial again soon? “In one sense, this is exactly the sort of event that the word ‘schadenfreude’ was invented to describe. But into every silver lining a cloud must come. For although it would be nice to welcome a former Madam Speaker Pelosi back into the airport security lines with the rest of us slobs, one feels a bit like St. Augustine contemplating his embrace of chastity: Give us Pelosi, Oh Lord, but not yet.”

NEWSWEEEK AS SPINAL TAP: Heh. I thought the same thing.

ECONOMY TANKS, blue-collar males hardest-hit. “Men also incurred about 80 percent of the job losses in the 1990-91 recession, but Sum said by his calculations the numbers this time were dramatically different. In the 1990-91 recession, men lost 1.037 million jobs. They have lost 4.5 million to date in this one.”

PHOTOS AND A REPORT, from yesterday’s L.A. Tea Party protest in Westwood.

VICTOR DAVIS HANSON: Politicians in Glass Houses, Hurling Stones.

COMPUTER GAMES: From cheap to free.

CHRYSLER: Take Our Cash: Please! “With an estimated 44k vehicles sitting on the lots of the 789 lame-duck Chrysler dealers, Mother Pentastar is going all-out to move metal. Although record incentives have already failed to make rain, the DetN reports that ChryCo will be sending ‘millions’ of $1K vouchers to previous customers. Chrysler marketing seems not to have heard of the ‘fool me once’ adage.”

STATE OF SURVEILLANCE: Ross Clark’s The Road to Big Brother gets a very positive review in the Wall Street Journal. I wrote the introduction, and I think it’s an important book.

REPORT: Toyota already has 75,000 orders for 2010 Prius.