THOUGHTS ON the software of civilization.

WORRIED ABOUT YOUR TEETH? Teeth whiteners are okay, but watch out for that orange juice.

INCREASING SKEPTICISM on electric cars?

THE IMPORTANCE OF carrying out “the wishes of the President.” Hey, he won.

GEE, DO YOU THINK? David Freddoso: Brace Yourself for Higher Taxes.

THE WAGES OF CHAVISMO: The Honduran coup is a reaction to Chávez’s rule by the mob.

MORE POSITIVE NEWS ABOUT STATINS. Of course, they have downsides, too.

MICHAEL BARONE: The Republican Party is going to have a hard time coming up with a strong presidential nominee in 2012.

RED-LIGHT CAMERA NEWS: Chicago ‘burb ditches red light cameras, no safety advantage. Indeed. (Thanks to reader Aron Spencer for the link). My earlier thoughts on the subject are here.

A SMALL VICTORY: NyQuil Survives Nanny State Police, For Now.

BOB ZUBRIN IN ROLL CALL: The Costs of the Cap-and-Trade Bill. “Consider: Burning one ton of coal produces about three tons of CO2. So a tax of $15 per ton of CO2 emitted is equivalent to a tax of $45/ton on coal. The price of Eastern anthracite coal runs in the neighborhood of $45/ton, so under the proposed system, such coal would be taxed at a rate of about 100 percent. The price of Western bituminous coal is currently about $12/ton. This coal would therefore be taxed at a rate of almost 400 percent. Coal provides half of America’s electricity, so such extraordinary imposts could easily double the electric bills paid by consumers and businesses across half the nation. . . . But all these bad aspects of the Waxman-Markey bill pale before its potential impact on the world’s food supply.”

DESTROYING TUMORS with computer-guided nanoparticles. Faster, please.

IN THE MAIL: The Ivy Portfolio: How to Invest Like the Top Endowments and Avoid Bear Markets.

UPDATE: Bad timing?

ANOTHER UPDATE: Mebane Faber emails:

A big thanks for the book mention!

Just to be clear, the book only uses the endowments as a starting point. We published a paper in 2007 that would have protected investors from the bear markets of 2008/09 (it’s Chapter 7 in the book). So while Yale and Harvard got hammered last year, our clients and readers should have been just fine. The paper is now the 10th most read paper on SSRN, so hopefully a lot of investors implemented it before the crash.

Interesting.

MORE: Faber emails: “PS Here is the performance for the strategy though 08.”

LITHUANIANS ON THE MOON: Michael Yon posts a dispatch from Afghanistan.

JULIAN KU: Is Obama Really Hypocritical on Signing Statements? Yup. “Hypocrisy is a strong charge. On the other hand, Obama explicitly denounced the ‘theory of George Bush that he can make laws as he is going along’ by using signing statements and then flatly promised not to use any such statements when in office. . . . Is there any defense for Obama? Not really.” Video at the link. Plus, Harold Koh, Kathleen Sullivan, Charlie Savage and other Bush-signing-statement critics are accused, too. I guess it’s only a matter of fierce moral urgency when there’s a Republican president . . . .

UPDATE: Savage responds in the comments, and calls my link above “characteristically vacuous.” I think that’s journo-speak for an accurate report from a blog, since all I did was report Ku’s post accurately. But see Savage’s response for his argument that he has not, in fact, been hypocritical.

And nice to know you’re reading, Mr. Savage.

THIS WOULD MAKE ME HAPPY, IF IT’S TRUE: Barry Goldwater’s Revenge: The Libertarian Shift Among American Republicans.

MICHAEL BARONE: Firefighter Case Shows Seamy Side of Racial Politics.

WOMEN SOLDIERS COME IN HANDY in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In both Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. Army and Marines found it useful to send a female soldier along on raids, as it was less disruptive to have a woman search the female civilians. There was no shortage of volunteers for this duty. The marines, as is their custom, saw more opportunities in this. Thus the marines began sending a team of women on such missions. . . . What the marines had also noticed was that the female marines tended to get useful information out of the women they searched. Iraqi women were surprised, and often awed, when they encountered these female soldiers and marines. The awe often turned into cooperation. Most Iraqi women are much less enthusiastic about fighting the Americans than their men folk (who die in large numbers when they do so.) Being a widow is much harder in the Arab world than it is in the West.

Read the whole thing.

HEH: Poll: Majority of Minnesota Voters No Longer Remember Who They Voted For.

EVERYTHING inside the state. And subject to the demands of those with sufficient “juice.”

RSSTED DEVELOPMENT: A review of Tyler Cowen’s new book, Create Your Own Economy: The Path to Prosperity in a Disordered World.

BRIAN DOHERTY: The Stimulus’ Slow Emergency: Good Thing the Economy’s Still in Trouble!

Freedom tastes of reality.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE on Mark Sanford.

AL FRANKEN THOUGHT: Caligula sent a horse to the Senate. Minnesota is just sending part of the horse.

KAUS AND HASEN on the Supreme Court and campaign finance.