CHARLIE RANGEL ON THE OIL SPILL: White House doesn’t have the “slightest clue.” From the comments: “Rangel is obviously racist.”

GOOD NEWS ABOUT TESTOSTERONE: “In humans, however, the hormone seems to motivate for rational decision-making, social scrutiny and cleverness, the apparent tools for success in a modern society.”

REVIEWING THE REVIEWERS: A roundup of book reviews from all over.

CONFERENCE: Is The (Real) News Dead? I understand Helen Thomas has been invited. . . .

ADVICE ON BOOZE, from Christopher Hitchens. I believe they call that “the voice of experience.” From his memoir, Hitch-22.

JOHN TIERNEY DARES TO DISCUSS WOMEN IN SCIENCE:

I’m all in favor of women fulfilling their potential in science, but I feel compelled, at the risk of being shipped off to one of these workshops, to ask a couple of questions:

1) Would it be safe during the “interactive discussions” for someone to mention the new evidence supporting Dr. Summers’s controversial hypothesis about differences in the sexes’ aptitude for math and science?

2) How could these workshops reconcile the “existence of gender bias” with careful studies that show that female scientists fare as well as, if not better than, their male counterparts in receiving academic promotions and research grants?

I blame the patriarchy. For everything.

IN THE NEW SPACE RACE, here come the entrepreneurs.

Four years from now, the company plans for real modules to be launched and assembled into the solar system’s first private space station. Paying customers — primarily nations that do not have the money or expertise to build a space program from scratch — would arrive a year later.

In 2016, a second, larger station would follow. The two Bigelow stations would then be home to 36 people at a time — six times as many as currently live on the International Space Station.

If this business plan unfolds as it is written — the company has two fully inflated test modules in orbit already — Bigelow will be buying 15 to 20 rocket launchings in 2017 and in each year after, providing ample business for the private companies that the Obama administration would like to finance for the transportation of astronauts into orbit — the so-called commercial crew initiative.

All is proceeding as I have foreseen.

HOW TO PREVENT a home-plumbing nightmare.

I’VE MENTIONED THIS BEFORE: A Self-Appointed Teacher Runs a One-Man ‘Academy’ on YouTube: Are his 10-minute lectures the future? “The lo-fi videos seem to work for students, many of whom have written glowing testimonials or even donated a few bucks via a PayPal link. The free videos have drawn hundreds of thousands of views, making them more popular than the lectures by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, famous for making course materials free, or any other traditional institution online, according to the leaders of YouTube’s education section.”

And, from a supporter:

“The next bubble to burst is higher education,” he said. “It’s too expensive for people—there’s no reason why parents should have to save up a hundred grand to send their kids to college. I like that there are alternative ways of thinking about teaching.”

Hmm. Where have I heard this before?

MARK TAPSCOTT: Whatever Happened to Cheap Speed?

STUDENT LOANS AND THE SECOND RECESSION: “The banking industry fell into collapse after a series of defaulted home loans, but what about the student loans granted at the same time? At the same time the banking industry was supplying people with loans without verifying that they could afford them, the same thing was happening with student loans. Many students were permitted to borrow tens of thousands of dollars on the expectation of their future earnings. Today, those same students are coming to the end of degrees, or just graduating, with no idea how they will repay their debts.”

AT BIG JOURNALISM, looking at research as propaganda.

FROM RON RADOSH, A CHALLENGE TO THE NEW YORKER: Open Your Pages!

IN THE MAIL: From Brian Tracy, No Excuses!: The Power of Self-Discipline. A theme recently sounded by our President.

COPYEDIT FAIL: David Brooks’ column defending the liberal arts includes this howler: “But allow me to pause for a moment and throw another sandbag on the levy of those trying to resist this tide.” Unless he thinks people are being taxed to resist vocationalism, it should have been levee. He’s right, of course, about the value of studying the humanities — so long as the study is rigorous, and not feelgood PC schlock, as it unfortunately often is these days. Brooks writes: “If you go through college without reading Thucydides, Herodotus and Gibbon, you’ll have been cheated out of a great repertoire of comparisons.” But, of course, those are Dead White Males all.

Not so sure that “The Big Shaggy” counts as rigorous, though. And I couldn’t help thinking of this.

UPDATE: Reader Matthias Shapiro writes:

I’m a big fan of the liberal arts, but I think we need to start making some major distinctions in the realm of education. Just because someone had a class with Thucydides, Herodotus and Gibbon on the syllabus doesn’t mean they have an education.

Millions of people have learned far more about these writers for free via Wikipedia than through paying $3,000 to listen to a professor poking students to keep them awake.

I would agree that an education in the liberal arts is vitally important. But I would disagree that a formal education in the liberal arts holds the importance it once did. Mr. Brooks doesn’t seem to make this distinction; to him, if people aren’t learning it in college, they aren’t learning it at all.

Unfortunately, when liberal arts are placed in college courses, the readings tend to be (by necessity) rigid and inflexible. Interested in philosophy? Hope you don’t grow attached to Socrates because if we happen to cover him the same week you have that chemistry test, you might not catch much. Interested in theories of morality and worldviews of individualism? Ayn Rand is a great read and very provocative, but your class will probably never get around to talking about her.

The simple fact of the matter is that formal education is extremely expensive while self-education is cheap, expansive and more accessible than it has ever been. We should learn to appreciate the latter and not assume that formal education is the only possible means of expanding our horizons.

Yeah. Also, Brooks should maybe reading his own paper on this. Or mine.

Plus, the original Brooks copy error has been fixed. InstaPundit gets results! Thanks to reader Michael Reed for pointing out the change.

MATT WELCH ON THE REVOLT AGAINST THE PUBLIC SECTOR: “What’s missing every time this debate comes up is any actual defense of the basic and 100 percent undeniable trend line–we are paying much, much more money to deliver government services that (with few exceptions) are not performing any better, and the single biggest line item in that cost increase is employee compensation. The burden of proof is on the people pocketing our taxpayer dollars, and yet they continue to dissemble, whine, and change the subject (and sometimes even shrug), rather than robustly defending the public policy mess they have been instrumental in creating. As long as We Are Out of Money, they (and their apologists) will rightly be on the defensive.”

SUBSCRIBERS ONLY: A PJTV Insta-Inquisition: Your chance to ask me questions.

FIGHT THE POWER:

Brian McCrary found the perfect venue to gripe about a $90 speeding ticket when he went to the Bluff City Police Department’s website, saw that its domain name was about to expire, and bought it right out from under the city’s nose.

Now that McCrary is the proud owner of the site, http://www.bluffcitypd.com, the Gray, Tenn., computer network designer has been using it to post links about speed cameras – like the one on U.S. Highway 11E that caught him – and how people don’t like them.

They don’t.

BACK UP YOUR BRAIN: I wrote a song about that in the old Mobius Dick days — sorry, not online anywhere as far as I know — but now it’s a big story in The New Scientist. Meanwhile, for those interested in science-fictional treatments, I recommend Greg Egan’s Permutation City.

RICK MORAN on living through a tornado. Note this passage: “Two decades ago, there almost certainly would have been fatalities in Streator. Back then, we were lucky to get five minutes of warning. Now, with our new understanding of tornadoes — how they form, what feeds them, Doppler radar images, and an idea of their path of destruction — precious minutes of warning are granted those in the path of these killers.”

Technology does save lives. That’s one reason why I got one of these weather radios after hearing a similar story.

THE GREAT DISCOURAGEMENT: “It is becoming clear to the man on the street that the unemployment situation is bad and not getting better any time soon. And a whole lot of people are giving up even trying to find a job.” Upside — the “headline” unemployment number would be higher if they kept trying!

OUR ANGRY PRESIDENT: Lifting the “ass-kicking” phrase from . . . Hank Hill? Well, the speechwriters probably watched that episode at the staff beer bust. So lighten up, Ace. It was research. More on Obama’s latest unseriousness here.

Personally, I’m reminded of Jimmy Carter saying “I’ll kick his ass” about Ted Kennedy. But then, I’m reminded of Carter a lot lately.

UPDATE: Reader John Shirey offers a correction:

In reference to a primary challenge in 1980 from Ted Kennedy, Mr. Jimmy replied “I whip (not kick) his ass!” Ted’s rejoinder (with a smile): “I thought the president said he would whip inflation now.” People still had a sense of humor in those days.

Well, both Ted and Jimmy had much to be humorous about. But wasn’t it Gerald Ford who said “Whip Inflation Now”?

NANOTECHNOLOGY: The Hot Job of 2018!

HMM: Column on Helen Thomas spiked.

OBAMA: DON’T MAKE EXCUSES. Dan Riehl is unimpressed. “Let’s see. Blame Bush, the GOP, blogs, Wall St., Fox News, BP and whatever else. But, don’t make excuses. Got it. Check!” Do as I say, not as I do. A familiar mantra of the political class. And Ashton Kutcher!