TODAY ONLY: KitchenAid Stand Mixers for $259.99. (Bumped, because it’s a deal.)

HOW’S THAT “SMART POWER” STUFF WORKIN’ OUT FOR YA? General: Worst U.S. image in Pakistan ever. “President Obama promised to restore the international image of the United States, but the recent NATO airstrike that killed Pakistani soldiers comes as a historic setback, at least in Pakistan.”

AND A CERTAIN “TRUE CONSERVATIVE” BLOGGER’S HEAD EXPLODES: Sarah Palin: I’m Thankful For Trig.

CLIMATEGATE AND Goldman, Sachs?

PROF. DONALD DOUGLAS takes a stand against bigotry.

HAS THE GAO BEEN COMPROMISED? Obama administration, GAO appear to have ignored group’s ACORN affiliation to award $700K. “The Obama administration has awarded more than $700,000 in taxpayer funds to AHCOA despite a 2010 law stipulating that no taxpayer funds could be awarded to ACORN ‘or any of its affiliates, subsidiaries, or allied organizations.'”

DAVE PRICE: PIIGs and Troughs. “The problem is, no one believes the PIIGS will keep their promises.”

JENNIFER RUBIN ON BARNEY FRANK: Good Riddance! “His real legacy will be his cluelessness and indifference to reforming Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.” Which was a major cause of the current financial crisis.

UPDATE: Something to remember: The White House Warned Congress About Fannie Mae Freddie Mac 17 Times In 2008, Alone.

CHRIS CHRISTIE ON THE SUPER COMMITTEE: What the hell are we paying Obama for? Golf.

#OCCUPYFAIL: “Mostly Peaceful” Occupy Portland Anarchists Found With Body Armor and Machetes.

Sounds like they’ve been reading too much Steve Stirling. If that’s possible.

SIGNS OF PROGRESS IN CANADA: B.C. Tory leader wants bulb ban reversed.

Well, with Canada renouncing the Kyoto protocols, maybe there’s hope. For Americans, however, things don’t look so bright. But it’s not too late to stock up! Yet.

TAKING THE LONG VIEW: “Long after the time in which anyone can easily recall who was US president in 2011, or what party was in power, or which wars of declining empire were fought, and then long after anyone even cares about that ancient history, and later, long after the whole download slope of the history of the US is but a footnote of interest to scholars of the transition from second to third millennium, and later still, long after anyone can even find out with any great reliability who was US president in 2011 … long after all these things are forgotten, the first half of the 21st century will still be clearly recalled as the dawn of the era in which aging was conquered.” Let us hope.

DEEP-SEA FISHING 42,000 years ago. “What’s still unknown is how these ancient people were able to catch these fast-moving deep-ocean fish.”

AT AMAZON, Cyber Monday markdowns on DVDs.

PERHAPS THE VIRGINIA ATTORNEY GENERAL SHOULD INVESTIGATE: Richmond, VA Slaps Local Tea Party with a (Political) Tax Audit. I’d at least do a state FOIA request on all communications relating to this action. Also, the local Tea Party should drop by the Mayor’s house, since the ACORN and Occupy people have established that as a perfectly acceptable protest tactic.

“THE WORLD IS UNFAIR:” “Such is life when you allegedly insult Barack Obama. Had she only done this when George W. Bush was president she’d be a worldwide celebrity.”

MICKEY KAUS: “Is it too fusty to ask, if we can’t call illegals ‘illegals,’ and we can’t call illegals ‘undocumented immigrants,’ what words can we use? Is this one of those cases where we just need a new term every decade or so as the old term becomes tarnished by popular opprobrium? Or is the whole idea of distinguishing between people who have complied with immigration laws and people who haven’t complied with immigration laws now a forbidden thought?”

NANOTECHNOLOGY UPDATE: Researchers make magnetic nanoparticles that can latch on to harmful molecules and purge them from the blood. “The project involves magnetized nanoparticles that are coated with carbon and studded with antibodies specific to the molecules the researchers want to purge from the blood: inflammatory proteins such as interleukins, or harmful metals like lead, for example. By adding the nanomagnets to blood, then running the blood through a dialysis machine or similar device, the researchers can filter out the unwanted compounds.”

Faster, please.

STONEWALL: Napolitano, DHS Still Silent on Mohamed Elibiary. “Before publishing the original article, I spoke with DHS spokesman Chris Ortman. After grilling me about the nature of my source, he immediately terminated the conversation after I asked him how and when Elibiary got access to the HS SLIC system, telling me he would have to get back to me. Needless to say, I’m still waiting for that return phone call, despite follow-up emails.”

ENCOUNTER BOOKS TO PUBLISH America 3.0 by Jim Bennett and Michael Lotus.

#GREENFAIL: “Alberta’s $60 million carbon-cutting program is failing.”

CYBER MONDAY: 25-30% off Shoes & Accessories. Men’s, women’s and children’s.

HAPPY 20TH ANNIVERSARY to the Institute For Justice.

KAY HYMOWITZ: How Brooklyn Got Its Groove Back. “It’s a story that contains plenty of gumption, innovation, and aspiration, but also a disturbing coda. Brooklyn now boasts a splendid population of postindustrial and creative-class winners—but in the far reaches of the borough, where nary a hipster can be found, it is also home to the economy’s many losers. . . . For all their energy and creativity, Brooklyn’s young entrepreneurs tend to have few employees, and they’re not likely to be hiring large numbers in the future. The factories of the past employed hundreds, if not thousands; Dumbo alone once had three firms that each employed more than 1,000. Today, Etsy, one of the area’s more successful companies, has a staff of just 180. The old Brooklyn Navy Yard now rents space to 275 businesses, employing 5,800 people. That’s an impressive rise from 3,600 in 2001, true. But compare it with the Yard at its World War II peak, when it had 71,000 workers, or in 1959, when it employed ‘only’ 15,000. Even Brooklyn Brewery has only about 50 employees, small potatoes when you consider that Schaefer Beer’s Brooklyn factory—now a luxury building called Schaefer Landing—once had 1,000. . . . Brooklyn’s story, then, doesn’t lend itself to a simple happy ending. Instead, the borough is a microcosm of the nation’s ‘hourglass economy.’ At the top, the college-educated are doing interesting, motivating work during the day and bicycling home to enjoy gourmet beer and grass-fed beef after hours. At the bottom, matters are very different.”

“THIS IS MY JOB:” What it’s like to be a custom parts fabricator.