WASHINGTON POST: The odd responses of the attorney general to the oil spill. “The Justice Department frequently finds itself handling both the civil and criminal aspects of an issue, and the attorney general obviously is in charge of both; there’s nothing improper about that. But because decisions to indict must be made without any political influence and without any regard to political consequence, the attorney general must take great care to avoid even the appearance of conflict.”

Doing things without political influence or calculation isn’t Holder’s forte, and it’s certainly not why he was hired.

DIPLOMATIC LANGUAGE FROM THE STATE DEPARTMENT. I’d prefer something beginning You miserable barbarian thugs . . .

THE PURSUIT of happiness.

BUMMER: Arthritis Inevitable After Surgery On Ligament Repairs. “If you’ve had an ACL tear or cartilage damage then osteoarthritis lies in your future until cell therapies and gene therapies are developed that can do full repair. . . . Gotten yourself pretty banged up by sports, yard work, or an accidental fall? You need the development of gene therapies and cell therapies to render you fully repaired. Otherwise painful arthritis lies in your future.”

CONTROL: UK committee says fuel prices must stay high to force drivers into efficient cars.

AMAZON INTRODUCES a new generation of the Kindle DX, and cuts the price.

DAN RIEHL: A Lesson In New Media For The GOP From The GOP.

THE CRUEL ONES: “The path of big government and the welfare state is the path to broken promises and inter-generational warfare. The workers in California and vendors in Illinois are paying the price for the unsustainable public sector union contracts which preceded them, sometimes by decades. Yet those of us who call for fiscal sanity and reform are derided by people like Sheldon Whitehouse and other Democrats as having no compassion. Just the opposite is true. It’s called tough love. Those who feed the big government addiction are the cruel ones.”

Related: Why Cloward-Piven Will Eat Itself. Well, did that strategy actually do anything for NYC welfare recipients when it was first tried? I don’t think so.

FASTER, PLEASE: Stem cells from blood a ‘huge’ milestone. “Blood drawn with a simple needle stick can be coaxed into producing stem cells that may have the ability to form any type of tissue in the body, three independent papers report in the July 2 Cell Stem Cell. The new technique will allow scientists to tap a large, readily available source of personalized stem cells.”

ZOMBIE KILLERS in Afghanistan.

POLITICO: Gore Story Goes Mainstream.

ATOMIC FIREWORKS in the Cold War.

A BLOG FROM AN Army surgeon in Afghanistan. Recommended by Michael Yon.

IN THE MAIL: From Jack Martin, JOHN BROWN’S BODY: An Alphonso Clay Mystery of the Civil War.

PJTV: Kruiser Control: “Stark” Naked Truth About the Border, Plus Olbermann Connects the Big Biz Dots.

ILLINOIS: The Fiscal Poster Child For What Not To Do.

A LOOK INTO AMERICA’S FUTURE? More problems with Massachusetts’ health care plan.

THE ANSWER IS YES: Is Obama attempting to portray those who are against illegal immigrants breaking our laws as racists? Duh.

ROBERT BYRD and the privileges of aristocracy. “Of course, the NAACP’s embrace of Byrd has nothing to do with principle. It’s a heartless, soulless political calculation, made by a group that profits handsomely from the immense government Byrd nourished. . . . This moral barter system is available only to the aristocracy. . . . When we observe that no Republican could hope to have his biography re-written to transmute bitter racism into championship service in the cause of civil rights, we aren’t merely clucking our tongues at the unfairness of partisan dirty pool. We’re watching one of the supreme moral judgments of our society become another sharp fang in the jaws of the leviathan State. Few indictments in our culture are more devastating than the charge of racism… and this charge is applied, or neutralized, almost entirely on the basis of the target’s usefulness to the State.”

BYRON YORK: Liz Cheney Calls For Michael Steele To Step Down.

ED DRISCOLL: It’s Hard To Talk When You’re Sandbagging CNN. Heh.

GOOD GRIEF: NRA e-mail: You know who’s pretty great on guns? Harry Reid. They’re not helping Harry Reid here. They’re just hurting themselves.

UPDATE: A reader emails with a good point: “I’ll give you 4 words why NRA should support Reid. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.”

100 GREATEST movie insults of all time.

VETERAN COMPLAINS about Elena Kagan’s exclusion of military recruiters.

JOURNALISM! JournoList Member Eric Alterman Defends JournoList Enterprise.

Maybe I should say “JournoLism.”