FASTER, PLEASE: Computer Scientists May Have What It Takes to Help Cure Cancer. “Fortunately for the rest of us, the cost of turning pieces of DNA into digital information has improved: The costs dropped a hundredfold in the last three years. The tipping point before widespread use is believed to be $1,000 per individual genome, which is a reason for the major investment in reducing its cost. Given such dramatic improvement, we could soon afford to sequence the genomes of the millions of cancer patients, which only billionaires could afford a few years ago.”

PHIL BOWERMASTER: Renaissance and Recovery.

SURE LOOKS LIKE IT: John Hinderaker: Was Fast And Furious All About Gun Control? “We certainly want to be fair to the Obama administration officials who were involved in Fast and Furious. But a fundamental question has never been answered: why in the world did the Obama administration not just allow AK-47s and other weapons to be shipped across the border to Mexican drug gangs, but encourage and even finance such transactions, over the objections of jittery gun shop owners and its own veteran agents? If the Obama administration wasn’t trying to set up an argument for more gun control, then what was it trying to do?”

UPDATE: Ann Althouse: “If Hinderaker’s conclusion seems extreme, consider that it could be easily refuted by a clear statement from the Obama administration disclosing the true and legitimate purpose. The absence of such a statement propels us toward the extreme conclusion.”

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Law School Stimulus: $54.3 Billion Student Loans Through 2020. The graphics on graduate debt levels are just plain scary. Just remember: Something that can’t go on forever, won’t.

KEITH HENNESSEY: Three Layers Of The European Debt Crisis.

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF NAKEDNESS.

A LESSON IN FAIRNESS FOR OBAMA:

President Obama this week started testing his new campaign theme, replacing “hope and change” with the equally vacant promise of “fairness.” Apparently he hopes Americans can be fooled twice.

In a talk Tuesday at the site of Teddy Roosevelt’s “New Nationalism” speech, Obama repeatedly invoked the notion of fairness. “We are greater together,” he said, “when everyone engages in fair play, everyone gets a fair shot, everyone does their fair share.”

The problem is that fairness, just like hope and change, can mean anything anyone wants it to.

How convenient.

SOMETHING THAT CAN’T GO ON FOREVER, WON’T: CBO: U.S Deficit Ran $240 Billion For First Two Months Of Fiscal 2012.

RUSSIA: Anti-Putin Protests Grow: Tens of thousands say they are prepared to take to the streets in the biggest challenge yet to the country’s government.

TEN YEARS AGO ON INSTAPUNDIT: Explaining guns to David Brooks.

SO SOMEHOW A COUPLE OF PAGES GOT LEFT OUT OF THE SCAN ON MY SCIENCE FRAUD PAPER, but there’s a complete version posted now. Download if you like — it’s free! (Bumped).

AT AMAZON, recommended gifts for geeks.

Also, a killer DVD collection, on sale today only: Clint Eastwood: 35 Films, 35 Years. (Bumped).

WALT DISNEY’S FIVE GREATEST INNOVATIONS.

AS THEY SHOULD: Lawmakers Blast Administration For Calling Fort Hood Massacre ‘Workplace Violence.’ “Sen. Susan Collins on Wednesday blasted the Defense Department for classifying the Fort Hood massacre as workplace violence and suggested political correctness is being placed above the security of the nation’s Armed Forces at home.” Sounds about right.

WELCOME TO THE 21ST CENTURY: Flying Robots Build 20-Foot Tall Tower.

#OCCUPYFAIL: Boston Judge: Occupy Protest Not Free Speech.

Eugene Volokh has thoughts.

AND SOME THOUGHT I WAS OVERLY CYNICAL FOR SUGGESTING THIS POSSIBILITY: New e-mails: ATF officials discussed using Fast & Furious to … push gun control. “But then, none of this is surprising: Congressional Democrats and even Eric Holder himself have already used F&F as a pretext to call for more gun control. I thought the sleaziest bit of White House scandal spin we’d see this year was the Energy Department asking Solyndra to hold off on layoffs until after election day in 2010. Nope: Per the new F&F e-mails, they’re actually using their own scandals now as a pretext for greater regulation. Says Dan McLaughlin, ‘Obama Administration once again lives down to every paranoid caricature of itself.’”

AT AMAZON, pre-Christmas deals in Electronics.

AT AMAZON, bestsellers in Automotive Safety.

WALTER RUSSELL MEAD: How To Ruin Your Life. “It is hard to know which is more disturbing, here: that a college can accept student loan money for a course like this without being charged with financial fraud or the vapid thinking and limp prose that Globe editors evidently think belongs in their newspaper.”

RANDALL PARKER: “So really, Romney’s the best bet for the Republicans. He’s got very high analytical skills, understands finance, understands business management, and knows how to be a CEO. His Mormonism is not important. That he governed a liberal state from a moderate position was really the only choice he had as governor of Massachusetts. He’s not a nut case or a dummy like some of the other Republican candidates. He harkens back to an earlier (and better) Republican party when executive competence mattered and ideological zeal was suspect.”

I can understand why people think he’s a squish. But (1) he was a lot of conservatives’ favorite against McCain; and (2) if you’re really worried, focus on the Congressional elections. Which isn’t a bad idea regardless.

GALLERY: 2011’s Top Pictures From Space.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: “The problem is not that we are overeducating ourselves as many would have you believe. Rather, it’s that we are spending a fortune to undereducate ourselves.”

SEVEN WAYS to save an extra $10,000.

Here’s an earlier post of mine on financial planning.

SIX MORE REASONS why the job market is still bad.