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DOG-EATING PRESIDENT JOKES ABOUT EATING DOGS. Jim Treacher tweets: I win. No blenders were mentioned, however.

Also: Jimmy Kimmel jabs Obama/Holder over Fast and Furious; most of D.C. media/Hollywood celebs scratch heads.

MORE ON THOSE UNDERFUNDED / OVER-GENEROUS PUBLIC PENSION PLANS: How Retirement Benefits May Sink the States.

Government retiree costs are likely to play an increasing role in the competition among states for business and people, because these liabilities are not evenly distributed. Some states have enormous retiree obligations that they will somehow have to pay; others have enacted significant reforms, or never made lofty promises to their workers in the first place.

Indiana’s debt for unfunded retiree health-care benefits, for example, amounts to just $81 per person. Neighboring Illinois’s accumulated obligations for the same benefit average $3,399 per person. Illinois is an object lesson in why firms are starting to pay more attention to the long-term fiscal prospects of communities. Early last year, the state imposed $7 billion in new taxes on residents and business, pledging to use the money to eliminate its deficit and pay down a backlog of unpaid bills (to Medicaid providers, state vendors and delayed tax refunds to businesses). But more than a year later, the state is in worse fiscal shape, with its total deficit expected to increase to $5 billion from $4.6 billion, according to an estimate by the Civic Federation of Chicago.

Rising pension costs will eat up much of the tax increase. Illinois borrowed money in the last two years to make contributions to its public pension funds. This year, under pressure to stop adding to its debt, the legislature must make its pension contributions out of tax money. That will cost $4.1 billion plus an additional $1.6 billion in interest payments on previous pension borrowings.

Business leaders are now speaking openly about Illinois’ fiscal failures.

Let’s just be thankful that the folks running our national budget don’t think the same way as . . . uh oh.

See, the thing is, some people say that people aren’t clever enough to plan for their own retirement. But what makes anyone believe that people can then be clever enough to plan for other people’s retirements?

Or as one commenter says:

So Nocera made bad, costly decision after bad, costly decision, and his conclusion is “The 401(K) is a failed experiment”?

Let me guess: the solution is a government-funded retirement for everyone. Yes, that’ll work out just fine. Nocera can retire, and I can pay for his retirement with my tax money.

Only if politicians value buying his vote more than yours.

UPDATE: Reader Joe Glandorf writes:

Nocera doesn’t seem to notice that defined benefit plans, both public and private, have failed and (for the public sector) are on the verge of failing, massively. Does he not know that all these beneficiaries will get downgraded from what they were “promised”? Yes, as recently as 20 years ago, managing a 401-k or IRA was expensive as well as challenging. Today, however, a complete investment novice can go on-line and quickly find a low cost, highly diversified, automatically re-balancing investment program from a number of sound investment firms (I use Vanguard) for one’s IRA if not an employer’s 401-k. These will, essentially, duplicate what any pension fund has historically done. The difference is that the beneficiary will know each step of the way where they REALLY stand and can control their spending and expectations accordingly. But that would take most people about 30 hours to do some thorough research. Apparently, this is too much for the Nocera’s of the world to expect from anyone; actually do some work understanding how to provide for your own financial security.

Of course, that won’t help you if you raid the fund to pay for new granite countertops. But then, that’s what our political leaders have been doing on a national scale for years.

ANOTHER UPDATE: A reader writes: “One recurring theme that I’ve noticed with 50-60 something NY Times columnists, and indeed men of that age in general, is that their financial woes involve a messy divorce earlier in their life. For people who are wondering why young men don’t ‘man up’ and marry, they may want to consider the effect of one example of divorce-induced financial ruin after another.” Well, that’s what the Insta-Wife’s forthcoming book is about.

And reader Jeff Randles emails: “If I raid my 401k then I’ve got the granite counter tops. If the government raids my 401k, then somebody else gets the granite counter tops.”

MORE: A reader who asks for anonymity comments: “Just wanted to point out that Teresa Ghilarducci was the Democrat operative that proposed the GRA to a congressional committee as a replacement for the 401K. That was what triggered the blogosphere backlash and the subsequent backpedaling of Democrats when it was suggested that they were trying to seize peoples’ 401K and IRA accounts. So having Joe Nocera quote her in his article about his 401K is a bit telling, don’t you think?”

MORE STILL: Reader Theodore Simon spots an irony:

‘What, then, will people do when they retire? I asked Ghilarducci. “Their retirement plan is faith based,” she replied. “They have faith that it will somehow work out.” ‘

Isn’t that precisely what Congressional Democrats always offer as their excuse for doing nothing to ensure the long-term viability of Social Security and Medicare, that in the end, it will “somehow work out”?

As I say, if people are too dumb to plan for their own retirements, they’re probably too dumb to plan for other people’s, too. And certainly there’s no evidence that the folks in Washington are any less dumb than the public at large.

STILL MORE: Reader John Primmer writes:

Professor Reynolds: Isn’t it telling that when a 60 year old NYT columnist wakes up to the fact that he has messed up his retirement plans, he turns to a “behavioral economist at the New School.” And the advice he gets is “OMG this is truly a mess. We must devise a new system to fix it.” As another reader observed, you can go online and have access to gobs of information that can help you make sound investment decisions. Or you can call on financial consultants employed by dozens of low-cost brokers/custodians, such as Schwab, Fidelity, T Rowe Price, E Trade, et al. In contrast to most politicians, reputable financial advisors realize that their advice has consequences and they will be judged on their performance.

Heh. Indeed.

THE HILL: Senate Democrats plan another trap for Romney with female voters.

I think Romney should promise that, if elected, he will seek to extend sexual-harassment law to cover members of Congress. Then ask Senators where they stand on that issue . . .

RAND SIMBERG: Rectification Of Names. “The ‘War on Terror’ may be over but the fight against Islamism continues.”

ELIZABETH WARREN: “Funny, she doesn’t look Siouxish.”

CREEPING ISLAMIZATION? British Docs Busted For Offering Female Circumcision.

MARK STEYN: Democrats Should Let Sleeping Dogs Lie. “My point is that self-loathing cultural relativism is so deeply ingrained on the left that any revulsion to dog-eating is trumped by revulsion to criticizing any of the rich, vibrant, cultural diversity out there in Indonesia or anywhere else. Most polygamy in the developed world is nothing to do with Mormons: It’s widely practiced by western Muslims, whose plural marriages are recognized de facto by French and Ontario welfare departments and de jure by Britain’s pensions department. But ‘edgy’ ‘transgressive’ leftie comics on sad, pandering standup shows will reserve their polygamy jokes for Mormons until the last stern-faced elder in Utah keels over at the age of 112.” Or until Mormons start sawing off heads. Transgressiveness has its limits.

Plus this:

Obama’s appetite for dogs isn’t as critical as his appetite for spending and statism. But it was part of his cool. “Mitt Romney isn’t cool,” declared Brian Montopoli of CBS News this week in a story headlined “Can Mitt Romney Make Boring Sexy”? For economically beleaguered Americans, the more pertinent question is: “Can Barack Obama Make Cool Affordable”? It’s not just that Obama ate the dog, but that he’s screwing the pooch.

Indeed.

MICHAEL BARONE: Obama Is Losing His Rock-star Status Among Young Voters.

SWIM CALL: “ARABIAN SEA (April 24, 2012) A Sailor jumps from an aircraft elevator during an all-hands swim call aboard the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72). Abraham Lincoln is deployed to the U.S. 5th Fleet area of responsibility conducting maritime security operations, theater security cooperation efforts and support missions as part of Operation Enduring Freedom. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Jonathan P. Idle).” Cool pic.

MIGUEL OCTAVIO: Notes From A Visit To Revolutionary Venezuela. I hope he’s right about Chavez’s prospects.

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HMM: “That’s how I might expect a very far-left fringe candidate to describe our successful mission to kill the head of al Qaeda.”

NEWS YOU CAN USE: Tips For Online Dating Over 40.

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Also, Blu-Ray releases under $10.

HMM: U.S. Amasses Stealth-Jet Armada Near Iran.

A DAN SAVAGE SCANDAL Twitter Roundup.

MARTIN ROTH: How a Misunderstanding with Instapundit Led to the First Directory of Christian Bloggers.

ASKING THE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS: Does 7 Days Of Sex Really Work?

So are we back to the whole maintenance sex thing? Not quite the same.

ROLAND MARTIN MELTDOWN, DAY TWO. I’d be more interested if I’d ever seen Roland Martin.

DAVID SWINDLE ON The hatred of Derrick Bell’s Afrolantica Legacies.

NO SECRET SERVICE CAREERS WERE HARMED IN THE MAKING OF THIS INTERVIEW: ‘Whores’ Glory’: An Interview With Michael Glawogger. Tracy Quan talks with the maker of a “surprisingly accurate” documentary about prostitution around the world.

HOW BIG GOVERNMENT is killing California. “When you’ve lost the entrepreneurs, free-spirits, and dreamers, you’ve lost the Golden State.”

RETROSPECTIVE: L.A. riots: Good Samaritan remembers his scary truck-driver rescue.

In one of the most disturbing images from the Los Angeles riots, six black assailants dragged Reginald Denny, a 33-year-old truck driver, out of his cab in South Los Angeles and bashed his head in with a brick. A television chopper broadcast the violence live. The attack happened shortly after not-guilty verdicts were handed down in the racially charged trail of the police beating of Rodney King, which kicked off six days of rioting that left dozens dead and thousands injured.

About a mile and a half away, Titus Murphy and his then-girlfriend Terri Barnett were watching the Denny attack on live television. Murphy, who was an unemployed engineer at the time, couldn’t believe what he saw.

“When this gentleman was getting beat something was just telling me this isn’t right, this isn’t what it’s all about,” he told Yahoo News 20 years later. “When he got hit in the head with the brick something told me to go down there. I just reacted.”

Read the whole thing. But I don’t think you can blame this on a “class of have-nots.” At least, if the races were reversed, you wouldn’t be getting socioeconomic excuses.

SO I GOT AN EMAIL LAST NIGHT THAT OPENED THIS WAY: “Hello Professor (or whichever intern may be reading this).”

I don’t have any email-reading interns. (In fact, I don’t have any interns at all.) That means I miss a lot of email, since I get something like 1500 emails a day. But I prefer to miss stuff randomly rather than subject it to some sort of systematic filtering. Alas, I’ve been busier than usual these last few months, which means I’ve been an even worse correspondent than usual. Sorry! I do my best, but there’s no way I can read, much less respond to, all the email I get.