LARRY RIBSTEIN: Government Spending, Cargo Cults, And Rules For Growth.

TODAY ONLY: Steep markdowns on Paint Shop Photo Pro X3. It’s not PhotoShop, but on the other hand, it’s a lot cheaper. And some people say it’s easier to use.

FROM PROF JACOBSON, A REMINDER: The Wisconsin Recalls Are Not Over. “Republicans have a chance to deliver a political coup de grâce to the national union and Democratic intimidation tactics next Tuesday when there are two elections seeking to recall Democratic State Senators Robert Wirch and James Holperin. These two were among the fleebaggers who ran away to Illinois.”

UPDATE: “This is what democracy looks like.”

JERRY POURNELLE ON EDUCATION:

Gates still does not address the Lake Wobegon problem. No one does.

Yet that was not universally true when I was young. There were places with great schools – many districts in California were held up as examples – and places with wretched schools, but none of that depended on luck, because each school district was responsible for education. No one thought that education in the United States was universally awful. Moreover, the resulting economy built by the products of that education system dominated the world. American Know-How was a cliché, but it was a cliché because it was so obviously true.

That has all changed in my lifetime, and the consolidation of education into state and federal monopolies with their complete control over local districts has produced what we have now: a great inequity

Indeed.

MEN LIVING LONGER: Women and minorities hardest hit? Actually, as old as that joke is, that seems to be the general tone in this discussion. . . .

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EUROPE: A call to bring back the Deutschmark.

POPULAR MECHANICS: U.K. Riots: What Survival Gear Are People Searching For?

Just remember for your own purposes, don’t wait so long to think about survival gear . . . .

SCIENCE: Polar Bear Scientist Faces New Questions. “A wildlife biologist is continuing to face questions about an influential paper he wrote on apparently drowned polar bears, with government investigators reportedly asking whether he improperly steered a research contract to another scientist as a reward for reviewing that paper. . . . Monnett’s report on what he observed raised public alarm about the threat of climate change and melting ice, and the sighting of dead bears was cited by Al Gore in his movie An Inconvenient Truth. The dead bears became a potent symbol of the perils that the bears face as the sea ice retreats. But now Monett is under an official investigation by the Department of Interior’s Office of Inspector General.”

In The Appearance of Impropriety, we noted that a lot of science-fraud investigations come up short, so don’t jump the gun on this one.

WELL, WHEN YOU POLITICIZE, YOU FORFEIT PUBLIC TRUST AND THERE’S A PRICE: Gun Query Off Limits for Doctors in Florida. And let me be clear: Anyone who denies that pediatricians in particular, and the AMA in general, have a politicized antigun agenda is a big fat liar. People don’t trust the medical profession here because it has an agenda they don’t share, and seeks to leverage its professional power to advance that agenda.

UPDATE: Physician-reader Danielle Emery emails: “Most doctors don’t share the AMA’s agenda, either. Their constituency is comprised mostly of medical students, residents and academicians who have their membership paid for by someone else- which might also explain their leftward leanings. The rest of us find a great deal more benefit in joining the medical societies of our respective specialties. I’m a lifetime member of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists but haven’t picked up a copy of JAMA in years- and when I did, it was mostly for the artwork on the cover.”

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Brant Hadaway writes:

Dr. Marcus gives the game away with the assertion that “[b]ecause the new law directly conflicts with accepted medical practices, some of my pediatrician colleagues have told me privately that they worry that not asking about firearms could put them at risk of a malpractice claim if the patient subsequently dies of or is injured by a gunshot.”

As a practicing attorney in Florida, I find this statement laughable. A doctor has no duty to ask questions about matters that are unrelated to reaching a medical diagnosis and prescribing treatment. Dr. Marcus tries to rig the duty of care issue with the phrase, “accepted medical practices,” but that falls far short of establishing a reasonable standard of care for treating anything other than injuries from a gunshot wound or, arguably, a pistol whipping. I won’t bore you with the causation problems inherent in her argument, which should be obvious.

As you often comment, sheesh.

Instead of viewing this law as an infringement on medical practice, physicians should see it as emblematic of how they’ve fallen in public esteem, and consider doing some self-examination. I don’t think that’s likely to happen, though . . . .

INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY: Pop Quiz: Why Are Tuitions So High? “An IBD analysis of data from the National Center for Education Statistics shows that from 1989-2009 the number of administrative personnel at four- and two-year institutions grew 84%, from about 543,000 to over 1 million.”

DOMESTIC TERRORISM UPDATE: AWOL soldier indicted in Fort Hood bomb plot. “Pfc. Naser Jason Abdo, 21, was indicted in Waco on charges of possession of an unregistered destructive device, possession of a firearm and possession of ammunition by a fugitive from justice, according to federal prosecutors. He faces up to 10 years in prison on each charge if convicted. . . . The soldier was approved as a conscientious objector this year after citing his Muslim beliefs, but that status was put on hold after he was charged with possessing child pornography. He went absent without leave from Fort Campbell, Ky., last month. A day after his arrest, a defiant Abdo shouted ‘Nidal Hasan Fort Hood 2009!’ as he was led out of a federal courtroom, an apparent homage to the suspect in the worst mass shooting ever on a U.S. military installation. He condemned that attack less than a year ago, but is now accused of trying to carry out another deadly attack.”

I’m inclined to think his condemnation was not sincere.

JAMES TARANTO: Progressives Are Betraying Obama, Not The Other Way Around. “Left-wing progressives have abundant reason to be unhappy with the Obama presidency. If it continues on its current trajectory, it could be the greatest setback to progressive ideology since the Vietnam War. Uygur is also correct in reckoning the president an atrocious negotiator as we argued last week. But the notion that Obama is not a progressive or has not been ‘fighting for progressive principles’–a very different activity from negotiating, we should note–is bunk. . . . In short, Obama is a fighter for the progressive cause. Progressives are upset with him because he is a loser. . . . Progs loved Bill Clinton because he was a winner. They loathe Barack Obama because he is a loser. But Obama is a loser in large part because he is unwilling to do what Clinton did to make himself a winner: cast aside progressive ideology when it is expedient to do so. Obama isn’t betraying the left, the left is betraying Obama–and they are doing so precisely because he has done what they say they want him to do.”

IT’S AS IF, DESPITE ALL THEIR PIETIES, FINGER-POINTING, AND MORALIZING, THEY WERE JUST HYPOCRITICAL SHILLS FOR THE DEMOCRATS ALL ALONG: Record numbers of U.S. troops are dying under Obama, but the anti-war movement is nowhere to be found. “Because he’s a Democrat, they don’t want to oppose him in the same way as they opposed Bush.” Hacks.

RECALL UPDATE: Unions Lose Big In Wisconsin. “How did Republicans hold out? It hasn’t hurt that Walker’s reforms have dramatically helped school districts within the state save millions of dollars by abolishing the main Wisconsin teachers’ union’s insurance racket. Nor does it hurt that Wisconsin, under the business-friendly leadership of Walker and a Republican state legislature, created more than half of the jobs created in the United States during the month of June. . . . This marks the unions’ third huge defeat in Wisconsin this year. The other two were the passage of Walker’s bill and the re-election of David Prosser to the state Supreme Court. The grand talk of recalling Walker himself next year seems a bit blustery now, given the great failure of last night.”

Paper tigers. Now let’s see if any Democrats get recalled next week.

UPDATE: A reader emails: “Now that Big Labor has lost the Wisconsin recall fight, how long before their allies in Washington at DOJ or NLRB investigate the elections for discrimination and/or seek to preempt the underlying collective bargaining law?” Such a loss of faith in government. . . .

MICKEY KAUS ON OBAMA’S RHETORIC:

“Not much further we can cut” seems like a hanging curve ball, an open invitation for ongoing ridicule–the sort of naive assertion that might come easily to someone who had never worked in the federal government, who only realized after promoting his half-trillion-dollar public works-based stimulus plan that there was “no such thing as shovel-ready projects.” Or someone who doesn’t want to know. Or who wants to act as if he doesn’t know.

Here is the official list of federal job openings. They are still hiring. Sure, big enterprises keep hiring essential employees even in tough times. But these aren’t essential jobs. Many of them seem like the sort of job a private firm, in a financial crisis like the feds are in, would consolidate with another job or leave unfilled. (The first one that jumps out is the “Associate Administrator for Administration” at the Department of Transportation, which pays $119,554 to $179,700. It seems that this person will do administrative work to maintain the layer of bureaucracy that “coordinates” the DOTs research programs. The new hire will also give “advice and assistance in directing, coordinating, controlling” etc. this little fiefdom. You don’t have to be Peter Drucker to realize that this position does not have to exist.)

Part of the problem, of course, is that since it is virtually impossible to fire an actual underperforming federal employee, conscientious administrators have to hire new people (or consultants) to actually do the work the unfireable employees aren’t doing.

But there’s no sense, reading through this list, that the federal bureaucracy knows it is in crisis–a crisis that might one day cause a GS-12 or GS-15 somewhere in the D.C. metro area to actually lose his or her job in the sort of streamlining layoff private firms routinely go through.

For the country, it’s an economic crisis. For Washington, it’s more like an opportunity.

For Republicans, my advice is to propose 5% real cuts — not “rate of growth” cuts but real cuts from last year’s budgets — across the board, and allow layoffs. There’s nothing sacred about the civil service rules, after all. They’re just statutes, statutes enacted back when the country had money. Let Obama argue that there’s not 5% of fat in the federal government. Nobody’ll believe him, especially among the majority of voters whose household budgets have been cut by a lot more than 5%.

BLAME: Boehner says there’d be no S&P downgrade if GOP budget had passed.

FEAR: Dems Beginning To Fear That Obama Is Unelectable.

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR JOHN MCCAIN, WE’D SEE CREEPY HOMELAND SECURITY SURVEILLANCE: And they were right! “Homeland Security plans to operate a massive new database of names, photos, birthdays and biometrics called Watchlist Service, duplicated from the FBI’s Terrorist Screening Database, which has proven not to be accurate many times in the past. DHS wants to exempt the Watchlist Service from Privacy Act provisions, meaning you will never know if you are wrongfully listed.”

YA THINK? Tumult on Wall Street threatens to spook consumers and further weaken the economy.

SAYUNCLE ON LONDON: “What’s the cause of the riot? I’m guessing lack of incoming fire.”

CREATING A DESERT, AND CALLING IT PEACE. “Even as state controlled media show pictures of devastated Hama, and declare unrest suppressed, demonstrations continue throughout the country. The Syrian government has lost the trust of other Arab governments, who are now openly criticizing the violence in Syria. Until recently, the Assad government had assured the other Arab states that the unrest in Syria would be handled peacefully and soon. Neither has happened, and the Arab states, Turkey and the West have all turned on the Assads.”

HEY, HEY, HO, HO, BARACK OBAMA’S GOT TO GO: Gallup: Majority say Obama doesn’t deserve second term.

But hey, it’s not just Obama: Meltdown: For first time, most Americans believe their own rep doesn’t deserve reelection.

RIOTS FLARE across UK. “In the northwestern city of Manchester, hundreds of youths rampaged through the city center, hurling bottles and stones at police and vandalizing stores. A women’s clothing store on the city’s main shopping street was set ablaze, along with a disused library in nearby Salford. Looters targeted stores selling designer clothes and expensive consumer electronics. . . . Neither Manchester nor Nottingham had previously been involved in unrest. There also were minor clashes for the first time in the central England locations of Leicester, Wolverhampton and West Bromwich, and the western city of Gloucester — where police and firefighters tackled a blaze and disturbance in the city’s Brunswick district.”

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