SCIENCE: Study: If aliens exist, they probably want to destroy us. Well, that’s heartening. But not unusual thinking.

I recommend this piece by Gregg Easterbrook. Excerpt:

James Trefil, of George Mason University, has cautioned that if evolution functions approximately the same way on other worlds that it has functioned here — conferring survival upon the fittest — advanced extraterrestrials might still be aggressive, territorial, and quick to reach for the sword. In that case, counting on poor alien marksmanship might not be prudent. Even if a message arrived from a great distance, we might for defensive reasons be compelled to assume that the senders knew something about the speed-of-light barrier that we didn’t, and withhold our reply.

The most disquieting aspect of natural selection as observed on Earth is that it channels intellect to predators. Most bright animals are carnivores: stalking requires tactics, pattern recognition, and, for social animals, coordinated action, all incubators of brainpower. Though the martial heritage of mankind has been exaggerated in popular fiction (there’s no proof, for example, that our Cro Magnon ancestors waged war against the vanished Neanderthals), it’s reasonably certain that the forebears of modern Homo sapiens were hunters, and it’s definite that man has been savage during the historical era. This isn’t much of a testimonial to “intelligence.”

Nor are herbivores necessarily non-aggressive, and they can certainly be territorial.

On alien invasions generally, a good fictional treatment is in Greg Bear’s The Forge Of God, For the more technically-inclined, there’s Ernst Fasan’s Relations With Extraterrestrial Intelligences, or some chapters in McDougal, Lasswell, and Vlasic’s Law and Public Order In Space. Kind of old, but still good. A more recent popular treatment that’s worth your time is Ben Bova and Byron Preiss’s Are We Alone in the Cosmos? The Search for Alien Contact in the New Millenium.

if aliens just don’t like us, there’s no need to invade. They could send a half-pound of deadly nanodevices on a stealthed probe. We probably wouldn’t even recognize what was happening as an alien attack.

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CHANGE: L.A. Times: Job approval of Congress jumps sharply as Republicans take over the House: Gallup.

Now don’t blow it, guys.

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR JOHN MCCAIN, we’d have a President who got big bucks from an oil company and then gave it political protection. And they were right!

The While House oil-spill commission made it official today: The entire oil industry, not BP, is evil and potentially the source of another Deepwater-sized spill. Thus the entire oil industry, which has already been punished by the administration with its drilling moratorium and slowdown in permitting, should be punished further with massive new regulations and fees.

Those conclusions were virtually predetermined when the administration appointed a panel heavily stacked with academics and environmentalists. And those findings are wrong. Why? A simple reality check: Other companies drilling in deep water in the Gulf have not had well blow-outs. But in BP’s case, the commission’s own studies show not just one mistake but a series of failed judgment calls by BP officials. Responsibility is specific, not collective.

Obama got record donations from BP, while BP got lax treatment from federal regulators. Now, post-disaster, Obama’s handpicked commission is letting BP off the hook.

If the Republicans were smart, they’d be making an issue of this.

UPDATE: A reader emails: “HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!” I think he’s referring to the “If the Republicans were smart” part. Sigh.

CHANGE: HOUSING MARKET SLIPS INTO DEPRESSION TERRITORY. No wonder they’d rather talk about Sarah Palin.

SARAH PALIN RELEASES A statement on the Tucson Shootings.

UPDATE: More here. And here’s the text on her Facebook page.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Lame complaints about the term “blood libel.”

Typically, but not exclusively, blood libels have been accusations against Jews. But blood libels have also been made historically against Christians — including Catholics and the Knights Templar — witches and pagans, and, more modernly, Satanists.

Liberals need something to mumble about, so goshdarnitow sometime between yesterday and today the term came to apply only to the Jews. They’d like you to believe this is “another” example of Palin’s ignorance, even though, as I said, by their own definition her use of the term is appropriate. As with their response to the Arizona shooting, facts-be-damned they’ve got a story and they’re sticking to it. . . .

This is willful ignorance so liberal commentators can feel good about themselves. Their slander over the weekend didn’t stick, so now it’s on to a new one. Notice, they can’t claim not to have made the false accusation that the Tea Party caused the Arizona shooting. So instead of defending it, which they can’t, they’ll just quibble about the words Palin used.

That seems to be how it works. And here are a bunch of examples of “blood libel” used in various contexts, by people as diverse as Andrew Sullivan and Ann Coulter, as well as Alex Beam, Michael Barone, Andrew Cohen of CBS, and Les Payne. Nobody cared, because Sarah Palin wasn’t involved. Heck, I used the term myself in my WSJ column. I got a grouchy email or two, but nobody else — even among the lefties who criticized it — seemed to care about the use of the term. This is the silliest hissyfit yet, and is itself evidence that there’s no substantive response.

MORE: No, the headline on my piece — “The Arizona Tragedy and the Politics of Blood Libel” — didn’t come from me. It was provided, as headlines usually are, by the WSJ. But I did use the term in the piece. My headline was “Have You No Decency?” Because what’s going on here — however much they’re trying to change the subject — is precisely the kind of McCarthyism the media left purports to disdain.

STILL MORE: Reader David Ringelman emails that Sarah Palin must have been reading Frank Rich, who wrote in 2006:

The moment Mr. Foley’s e-mails became known, we saw that brand of fearmongering and bigotry at full tilt: Bush administration allies exploited the former Congressman’s predatory history to spread the grotesque canard that homosexuality is a direct path to pedophilia. It’s the kind of blood libel that in another era was spread about Jews.

And yet, somehow, it slipped right by all those layers of culturally sensitive editors and fact-checkers at the New York Times. That’s because, once again, a made-up double-standard has been invented for a particular purpose. Really, is this all they’ve got? Yes.

FINALLY: Alan Dershowitz says “blood libel” is a perfectly acceptable metaphor, and many others weigh in.

THE FOUNDATION FOR INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS IN EDUCATION responds to Berkeley Chancellor Robert J. Birgeneau.

Birgeneau’s e-mail, if taken to its logical conclusion, seems to imply that minority groups and undocumented students at UC Berkeley might become violent if people in the campus community do not support the DREAM Act and if other examples of “hateful speech” go unchallenged on campus. While he avoids an outright call for censorship of certain opinions—such as opposition to the DREAM Act—he makes it clear that he would not be surprised if the voicing of these opinions led to another incident like that in Arizona. Birgenau thus implies that such expression is therefore both morally wrong and likely to endanger people’s lives through its very utterance.

It is within the Chancellor’s rights to officially encourage people at Berkeley to act and speak in accordance with the university’s officially sponsored moral principles. Yet, does the Chancellor really think students on his campus are so fragile, psychologically weak, and prone to violence that the campus is less “safe” when they see mean graffiti, experience racism, or hear “virulent” language against Israel? Even if someone on campus is truly so unstable and unsafe—a possibility in any institution as large as UC Berkeley—taking the steps necessary to ensure that such a person is never “set off” by speech he or she finds offensive would result in a campus that one would not even recognize as a part of America.

It’s almost like that’s the goal.

KATIE GRANJU: The Problems With Amy Chua’s “Tiger Mother” Hypothesis.

If Chua’s suggested parenting methods really work to create superior abilities in the children raised in this way, then the methods should be applicable to any area of activity or initiative. And while Chua smugly points to “tons” of studies in which Chinese kids are shown to make better math grades, I am going to have to checkmate her by noting the fact that there aren’t any Chinese kids playing in the NFL. Does the fact that such a high percentage of highly paid, very successful professional atheletes are African American mean that African American mothering is “superior” to Chua-style parenting? Obviously, I am engaging in a bit of pretzel logic here, but so is Chua, and she’s trying to use it to belittle and demean other cultures, stereotype her own culture, and of course, to sell books.

Speaking from personal experience, I’m pretty sure the last of these predominates. Read the whole thing.

UPDATE: No, I’m not talking about experience with Amy Chua — she came to the Yale Law faculty after I left and I don’t know her personally. I’m referring to the pressure put on authors to sell books. In particular, I was told that you should always have some outrageous statement that can be used to build publicity. In An Army of Davids, for example, I should have predicted that newspapers would be dead within a decade — or, better yet, within five years. Trouble is, I didn’t actually think that, but it would have generated a lot of buzz . . . .

ANOTHER UPDATE: Charles Murray: Amy Chua Bludgeons Entire Generation of Sensitive Parents, Bless Her.

RESPONDING TO DANA MILBANK: Prof. W. Joseph Campbell writes:

Milbank began his column by declaring:

“If any good can come of the horror in Tucson, it will be that this becomes a McKinley moment for Sarah Palin and her chief spokesman, Glenn Beck.”

A “McKinley moment”? Meaning what? An occasion for self-censorship because of the insinuations and false allegations raised against them in the aftermath of the shootings in Tucson–much as false allegations were raised against Hearst following McKinley’s slaying?

Not only is “McKinley moment” an imprecise construct: It suggests that using smears to batter foes into silence is somehow worthy or admirable.

Well, that does seem to reflect Milbank’s sentiments.

UPDATE: Dana Milbank’s classy response to a previous shooting.

JOHN STEELE GORDON: If You Can’t Stand the Heat . . . Harry Truman would have had little patience for the notion that caustic political rhetoric causes murder. Our current generation of politicians is much weaker, and much more thin-skinned, and vastly more endowed with a sense of entitlement, than in Truman’s day.

VICTORY LAP? John Nolte: New Media Soundly Defeats Left-Wing Media’s Political Witch Hunt.

UPDATE: Don Surber emails: “Great kid. Don’t get cocky.” Indeed.

CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION: A Quick Reminder On Paul Krugman And Climates of Hate.

UPDATE: Had this as the Christian Science Monitor initially. Not sure how I managed that, but it was probably because the coffee hadn’t kicked in yet.

BEN DOMENECH IN THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER: Peter King’s Silly Gun-Ban Idea.

Does Rep. King think that this law would have done anything to prevent the shooting of Rep. Giffords? Does he honestly think that Jared Loughner would’ve surrendered his firearm, or admitted to carrying it, if confronted within 1,000 feet of the congresswoman? Would he set up TSA-like checkpoints just in order to attend a town hall or other public event for any representative of the people, which is what it would take to enforce this law? Of course not. In fact, the only person we know for sure who admitted to carrying on the scene is Joe Zamudio, a civilian buying cigarettes in a Walgreen’s in the same shopping center — perhaps within 1,000 feet? — who ran to the sound of the gunfire and helped subdue the assailant.
Congratulations, Rep. King — you just made it easier for the bad guys.

King’s law is classic political idiocy of the worst sort: legislation timed to exploit outrage while doing nothing to solve a problem. If passed into law, it would disarm the law-abiding citizen, turn your average hunter into a criminal if they wandered into the wrong parking lot, and provide no barrier whatsoever to would-be assassins.

King should be ashamed of himself for trying to exploit this tragedy. And doubly ashamed of himself for the intellectual failure — and bloated self-importance — that this bill represents.

Ann Althouse has related comments:

Because the murder-free-zone law that protects the rest of us is just not working well enough. The high officials need a double layer of legal protection.

So when you gun-carriers are out and about, you’ll to have make sure you know who all the relevant officials are and where they are at all times and stay 1,000 feet away from there. And if, while you’re standing back out of the zone, somebody else, some non-respecter of gun-free zones, pulls out a gun and starts shooting, make sure you don’t cross the 1,000 foot line when you try to take out the shooter.

Indeed. And from the comments: “Let’s make more rules highlighting the difference between the Elite Class and everyone else. That will help with civility.”

Also: “Let’s make it illegal to bring a microphone within 1,000 feet of a Congressman.” Now you’re talking.

THE PLOT THICKENS: BBC Hits UK Govt with Freedom of Information Demand in Cold Winter Forecast Fiasco.

“PAUL KRUGMAN, BUFFOON.” Yes, he hasn’t just descended into self-caricature. He’s descended beyond self-caricature.

My guess is that Krugman has no idea when Michele referred to being “armed and dangerous,” or why, or what the rest of the sentence was. Krugman’s biggest problem isn’t that he is stupid. His biggest problem is that he is lazy. He is incapable of doing even the most rudimentary research, which is why his columns rarely contain many facts, and when they do, his “facts” are often wrong.

As it happens, I–unlike Krugman–know all about Michele’s “armed and dangerous” quote, because she said it in an interview with me, on my radio show. It was on March 21, 2009. The subject was the Obama administration’s cap and trade proposal. Michele organized a couple of informational meetings in her district with an expert on global warming and cap and trade, and she came on our show to promote those meetings. She wanted her constituents to be armed with information on cap and trade so that they would understand how unnecessary, and how damaging to our economy, the Obama administration’s proposal was. That would make them dangerous to the administration’s left-wing plans.

The interview illustrates quite well the difference between Michele Bachmann and Paul Krugman. Krugman is a vicious hater. He rarely argues any issue on the merits, but prefers to smear those who disagree with him. Bachmann is infinitely better informed than Krugman. All she wants to do is debate her opponents on the facts. . . . For the record, here is what Michele said: “I’m going to have materials for people when they leave. I want people armed and dangerous on this issue of the energy tax, because we need to fight back.” Yes, that’s right: she wanted Minnesotans to be armed with materials–facts and arguments–not guns. If this is the best example of “eliminationist rhetoric” that the far left can come up with, you can see how absurdly weak the claims of Krugman and his fellow haters are.

Krugman: Dumb and lazy. And mean. He’s quite a poster-child for the credentialed gentry. Audio of the interview at the link.

ERIC SCHEIE: “Sarah Palin made him do it!” means Narrative failure. “OK, I am not much of a feminist theoretician, but there is something I find odd about the way people — especially on the left — are not looking at this case. . . . There is only reason I can think of that they don’t, and that is because it is at total cross purposes with the left-wing narrative that Sarah Palin made him do it. Ditto the Tea Party movement, which is heavily female.”

LEADERSHIP: Speaker Boehner says no to new restrictions on firearms.

A MEDIA GUIDE for the journalistically challenged.

ARIZONA REPUBLIC TO SHERIFF DUPNIK: Shut Up And Remember Your Duty. “Enough attacks, sheriff. Enough vitriol. It is well past time for the sheriff of Pima County to get a grip on his emotions and remember his duty. . . . Dupnik needs to recall that he is elected to be a lawman. With each additional comment, the Democratic sheriff of Pima County is revealing his agenda as partisan, and, as such, every bit as recklessly antagonistic as the talk-show hosts and politicians he chooses to decry.”

UPDATE: Dupnik should have been doing his job before: Police Say They Visited Tucson Suspect’s Home Even Before Rampage.

HAVE THEY NO DECENCY? No shame at all? Not so much.

DAN RIEHL: It isn’t the rhetoric they fear, it’s the passion. Which the smear campaign has reignited. Oft evil will shall evil mar. And often does hatred hurt itself.

JOURNALISM: BBC on a Muslim’s Killing and Wounding of Five Christians in Egypt: “it is unclear whether the attack was sectarian.” We don’t want to jump to conclusions. That might promote hatred.

IN WHICH I REPEAT MYSELF:

When the lefty talking-point assault hasn’t even convinced Barbara Walters and The Economist is calling it “toxic,” it’s a pretty major fail. . . .

The biggest worry after the November elections was that a lot of people on the right would declare victory and go home. The shameless attempt to politicize the Tucson shootings and scapegoat people on the right has generated a huge amount of anger. Tea Party folks being who they are, I suspect this will mostly manifest itself as grunt-level political work in preparation for 2012 — precisely the opposite of what the scapegoaters were hoping for: Don’t get mad, get even, by making 2012 an even bigger shellacking than 2010.

Because I think this is the bottom line.

ANDREW MARCUS: Let’s Address Democrat Outrage Over Dangerous Rhetoric – Hold Hearings Immediately!

We propose that any investigation begin with events that led to criminal behavior, like say the WTO riots in Seattle. Or the RNC riots in St. Paul. Or the angry mob protests that have taken place at the homes of Bank of America executives. Or the Kenneth Gladney beating. That should provide a good start.

When would the Progressive Democrats like to schedule these hearings?

I’d love to see this.

HOPE, CHANGE, AND A NEW KIND OF POLITICS: Bernie Sanders Fundraises Off Arizona Murders.