NOBEL LAUREATE VERNON SMITH: The Deficit Is Bad For America. “So what has been the government’s response in the current crisis? Besides spending stimulus, it was tax incentives for new home buyers and cash for clunkers if you bought a new car. All three are programs for borrowing output, homes and cars from future production and sales. Using subsidies to pump up home sales beyond what people could afford was the problem that led to the crisis. Now the problem is touted as the solution.”

BREITBART’S USDA RACISM VIDEO gets CBS coverage.

UPDATE: Reader Paul Manner emails: “Of interest, the CBSTV site initially enabled comments, which have now disappeared down the memory hole.”

ANOTHER UPDATE: Well, the comments seem to be there now. Here’s the first one: “The difference between the tea party and the naacp is if you are looking for racists at the tea party you look at the fringe and if you are looking for racists at the naacp you look to the stage.” Ouch

WAR AGAINST PHOTOGRAPHY — AND ACCOUNTABILITY — CONT’D: Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police. “So then the question is, ‘Are the words of a police officer spoken on duty, in uniform, in public a ‘private conversation.’ And every court that has ever considered that question has said that they are not.” Police have no expectation of privacy. They certainly don’t recognize any such in the rest of us. And prosecutors who bring such charges should lose their jobs, and maybe their law licenses. Law enforcement officials who are afraid of public accountability do not deserve their offices, or our respect or deference. Act like a thug, expect to be thought of as a thug.

GOOD CAUSE OR NOT, the pink KitchenAid stand mixer just doesn’t do it for me. In fact, I’m surprised how negative my reaction is. I think its appeal is based on looking more rugged and industrial. . . .

ED DRISCOLL: Tales Of The JournoList.

BILL WHITTLE: Afterburner: One Small Misstep for a Man, One Giant Leap for Private Enterprise. As always with Whittle, it’s must-see PJTV.

UPDATE: Reader George Fillmore writes: “Bill Whittle for President.”

HIGH SCHOOL for the “ruling class?”

IN TODAY’S WALL STREET JOURNAL, I review Stephen Pyne’s Voyager: Seeking Newer Worlds In The Third Great Age Of Discovery. (Bumped).

THE CRISIS IN PUBLIC PENSION PLANS: A blueprint for New Jersey.

FIVE WILD TECHNOLOGIES being used to clean up the gulf oil spill.

MARKDOWNS ON tools and home improvement.

KEVIN WILLIAMSON: Do Not Trust Cornyn Or McConnell On Spending Cuts.

A TRAFFIC RESOURCE FOR KNOXVILLE AND EAST TENNESSEE: FoulkTraffic.com.

MORE ON the Voyager probes.

THE STRENGTH OF WEAK TIES: Why Facebook Friends Are Worth Keeping.

NEW YORK TIMES: MYSTERY FOR THE WHITE HOUSE: Where did the jobs go? Gee, where would you go to find an answer to that puzzling question? . . . .

UPDATE: Reader Dave Stine writes:

I think, actually, that the “Gee, where would you look for an answer to that question?” would do better to point at Professor Hanson’s piece you referenced @10:37am.

The economic policy in this country is now being driven by people who don’t know their ass from a hot rock about actually running a business. Obama’s administration is mostly composed of academics – something upon which you have touched in the past.

Since it is business and not academia that hires the millions of people necessary to reverse our job losses, policy wonks without real world experience would be puzzled and mystified why their policies are causing the situation we see now.

Well, good point.

FOUR APPS FOR losing weight. Not mentioned is the LiveStrong app, but I’ve got a friend who lost a lot of weight with that last year, and has kept it off so far.

SO READER PAUL SCHMIDT OWNS A MAZDA RX-8 LIKE I DO, but is thinking of trading it in for a new Mustang GT. He writes about his test-drive over the weekend:

It may be too obvious to mention, but the Rixxer and the Mustang are two very different cars. Although the reviews I’ve read say the Mustang handles pretty well, it’s not anywhere in the league of the RX8’s go-cart suspension. This has an upside, though: your kidneys don’t get hammered by every manhole cover, road patch and expansion joint you encounter. It’s a solid, comfortable ride- I don’t know offhand what the curb weights are, but the Mustang feels significantly heavier than the Mazda.

Acceleration, well, the Mustang has it all over the Rixxer. On one 40 – 80 run getting on the highway, I half expected the colors in front of me to be blue-shifted- that thing is a total rocket! I did a zero-to-40ish run which was quite fun, too. I understand it has traction control, but I didn’t try to turn it off; I think the dealer would have been irked with rubber flecks all over the rear quarter panels. What’s nice is it’s very docile driving around city streets, so there’s no penalty for the big motor in that respect.

The Mustang is easier to get in and out of (my wife and I are starting to get a little tired of climbing out of the Rixxer), and the back seat is marginally larger, as is the trunk. One nit: the rear seat headrests block some of the view out the rear window, but you won’t spend much time looking in that direction until the blue lights start flashing.

As a great driver once said, what’s-a behind-a me don’t matter. I take exception to the kidney-hammering bit, though. I find the RX-8 ride quite pleasant.

YOU, and your Johnson. A recipe for summer fun!

PROGRESS: Single-atom sheet of carbon clears arsenic from water.

A CATCH: Michael Totten signs on with Pajamas Media.

Here’s his first post.

WHAT BREITBART PROMISED, BREITBART DELIVERS: Video evidence of NAACP racism. “Breitbart delivers on that promise today at Big Government, showing USDA official Shirley Sherrod explain to an appreciative NAACP audience in July 2009 how she deliberately withheld information from a white farmer in Georgia trying to save his land and his business.” Maybe she should transfer to the Department of Justice. . . .

UPDATE: The Anchoress wants more tape.

WI-FI without a base station. “WiFi Direct promises to end the dependence of WiFi devices on nearby base stations: instead, they’ll communicate directly with each other, advertising their presence, setting up ad-hoc networks and even hooking up with old school WiFi enabled devices.”

POLITICO: Poll: D.C. elites a world apart.

IN THE MAIL: Seized: A Sea Captain’s Adventures Battling Scoundrels and Pirates While Recovering Stolen Ships in the World’s Most Troubled Waters.