JONATHAN ADLER: The End Of Ethanol? “The ethanol issue also presents Republicans with an opportunity to show how less government intervention can be better for the environment. . . . If Republicans fail to take action on ethanol, it will demonstrate the shallowness of their commitment to limiting government largesse and give credence to arguments that Republicans are only for less government when it’s good for special interests.”

MEGAN MCARDLE: 7 Thoughts About Ireland.

AT AMAZON, it’s the Christmas and Holiday Toy List.

PJTV: My interview with S.M. Stirling from last year is now on YouTube. I just finished his latest Change novel, The High King of Montival and it was very good. In particular, he handles the religious issues — both Christian and pagan — extremely well.

L.A. TIMES: Lowest ever: Obama job approval sinks to 39%, as even Democrats’ support melts away.

UPDATE: Obama’s Approval Rating on Economy at All-Time Low.

SEVERAL READERS ASK THE SAME QUESTION:

I’d suggest that anyone thinking of opting for the “pat downs” may want to ask the TSA agent when they last changed their gloves. I would worry about just what little “friends” were being carried on the gloves from previous searches.

And reader Benjamin Wang emails:

A disgusting thought, but I’ve never seen a TSA screener change gloves. It would be interesting to send in a HAZMAT team to test several sets of gloves and see what’s on them. And publicize the results.

Remember: The gloves are for their protection. Not yours.

UPDATE: Reader Daniel Briggs writes:

What a bunch of whiners. We walk through a body scan but some consider that too invasive. So then we’re subjected to pat-downs, aggressive ones at that. What the heck do we EXPECT?! We’re at war. . . . Better to suffer a little indignity than a major calamity.

I guess if I felt that the Administration were serious, I’d feel differently. But I’ve always been hard on the Homeland Security side of things, because it’s always been a clown show. Sorry. Always.

Plus, Dr. Alan Reitz emails on the glove-changing thing: “As a health care provider, I thought of this issue last week while going through the airport. If I did not change gloves between patients even if touching the patient on the arm, the health/infection control department would come down like a ton of bricks.”

ALONE ON A DESERT ISLAND — WITH AN ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER MANNEQUIN? “I wanted to bring more attention to social diseases.” Uh huh.

JUST WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS NOW: North Korea fires artillery barrage on South. If they start anything, I say nuke ’em. And not with just a few bombs. They’ve caused enough trouble — and it would be a useful lesson for Iran, too. We can’t afford another Korean war, but hey, we’re already dismantling warheads. . . .

UPDATE: A reader emails:

Years ago, I was one of those guys tasked with nuking North Korea, as an Air Force navigator/weapon system officer on F-4E Phantoms. I’d counsel caution today. The immediate problem is that North Korea has ten thousand artillery tubes pointed at Seoul, the capital of South Korea, where a large portion of the southern population lives. Basically, the North Koreans have a knife to the throat of South Korea. Temperance is a virtue in this situation.

North Korea has already lost the cold war with South Korea. It’s patrons have abandoned it. Starvation is breaking down the government. The military doesn’t have enough to eat. Even the secret police are now on the take to feed their families. The inevitable economic failure of the communist state has rotted out its political structure, which is ready to collapse, lacking only some precipitating event.

The best way to hasten the downfall of Kim Jong Il’s rotten regime is through information. The South Koreans used to fly propaganda into the North via balloons when the wind was favorable. How about bombarding North Korea with information by inserting radios and laptops into it? Some personal DVD players might help, North Koreans having a taste for South Korean video. Information is what North Korea fears most and for which its citizens are most hungry. Feed them with facts from the outside until they lose all faith in Kim Jong Il and fear of his government. It would be far better if the North Koreans overthrow their government than if we bomb them back into the Stone Age. The best case is for all those North Koreans manning the cannons across the Han estuary from Seoul is to lose faith in their mission and to simply walk away from their guns.

I agree, but that doesn’t help if they’re invading across the border, which is what I was talking about. Meanwhile, James Bennett emails:

You know, somehow there has arisen the idea that there’s some magic rule that prevents a nuclear power from using its nukes against a conventional state. That perception will probably persist until somebody attacks a nuclear power and gets nuked. Then everybody will wonder why anybody was stupid enough to believe that. Actually, that’s almost happened already.

Indeed.

MORE: Reader Bill McLane writes: “So what are we to do if Obama decides that this Korea thing could be a perfect thing with which to turn his ratings around? Like bomb them and become a war president? Like get us into a tussle with China? Do you think he is above this sort of calculation?” Nope. And if he does, Media Matters, Oliver Willis, et al. — maybe even Ed Cone — will praise his courage and decisiveness.

STILL MORE: No doubt they were clutching their pearls just as hard when Bill Clinton threatened to “erase North Korea from the map of the world.” Well, except for Oliver, who was busy with puberty.

ANOTHER REASON WHY UBIQUITOUS CAMERAS ARE GOOD: A single picture from a cell phone camera may have saved the Gulf of Mexico from a few more weeks — if not months — of oil gushing from the BP well.

USA TODAY: Poll: Tea Party Support Grows. The worse the establishment looks, the better the Tea Party looks . . ..

BARBARA BUSH knocking Palin to help boost Jeb?

PAUL KRUGMAN WORRIES ABOUT MONETIZED DEBT, HYPERINFLATION, AND DEFICITS — back in 2003. “Now we flash forward to 2010 and in KrugWorld the temptation of politicians to inflate our debt problems away has evaporated and anyone who opposes the monetization of government debt or worries about inflation that no one can yet see (unless they look at commodity prices) is a scoundrel. Good to know.”

SO IS THIS THE HOPE, OR THE CHANGE? Woman who told Obama her financial fears has lost her job.

Velma Hart, who burst onto the media scene after telling President Obama she was scared about her financial future, has been laid off. Hart was let go as the chief financial officer for Am Vets, a nonprofit Maryland-based veteran services organization.

But it has nothing to do with her critical public remarks to Obama.

MICHAEL LEDEEN: Sex Scandals.

AL GORE: On second thought, I was just pandering to the farm vote on ethanol.

Ann Althouse: “So… self-interest then. Where’s his self-interest taking him these days?”

UPDATE: Manny Klausner writes: “If you can’t trust Al Gore, who can you trust . . . ?” Heh.

TAXPROF: A Sucker’s Play — Each $1 in Higher Taxes Results in $1.17 of New Spending.

CHANGE: With Ortiz concession, GOP holds most House seats since 1949.

“SMART DIPLOMACY” (CONT’D): Taliban Leader in Secret Talks Was an Impostor. Remember how these people were going to bring back competence? “And we gave him a lot of money.”

UPDATE: Reader C.J. Burch emails: “This administration is a joke. A complete joke.” But not a very funny one.

MORE: Are These The High Level Peace Talks Or Have I Blundered Into A Comedy Club? It’s like Borat For Diplomats.

STILL MORE: Reader James Ellison writes: “I have one word for the administration: coulrocracy. Government by clowns.” Heh.

ABOVE THE LAW: In Defense of Law School — Namely, Touro and Other Fourth-Tier Schools. Just don’t go into debt.