MOE LANE: Collusion between Obama for America and Priorities USA on ‘their’ lying Soptic ads. “To sum up, there was an interesting point from @mike_scrimpf: le affaire Soptic does have more than a passing resemblance to an incident from 2010 where soon-to-be-former Ohio Governor Ted Strickland got caught recycling the same professional victim in his campaign ads. Not a point-to-point correspondence, but it does show just how non-spontaneous these spontaneous stories really are. Not to mention how effective they are, too. Which is to say, less than you’d think.”

ACE: Wait a Minute: Joe Soptic’s Wife Wasn’t Even Diagnosed With Cancer Until 2006?

Romney left Bain in 1999.

GST was shut down in 2001.

Soptic’s wife had her own health insurance through 2003.

Now, in 2006, she was diagnosed — diagnosed! — with very late-stage cancer.

She died 22 days after diagnosis.

Is the argument made that Romney owed this guy another seven years worth of insurance coverage?

And what good would it even have done? She wasn’t even diagnosed until just over three weeks before she would die.

What?!

I have to point this out because until now I’d been assuming she was suffering with cancer for years.

I knew this ad was preposterous, but this is just too much.

Or typical.

JIM TREACHER: And now, a recap of all the news about National Starbucks Appreciation Day.

Related: Anyone Notice What Was Missing From Memeorandum Today? “You mean in New York they couldn’t manage any kind of anything? NEW YORK!?”

BRIDGET JOHNSON: Do All Signs Point To Portman?

WEIGHT TRAINING MAY LOWER DIABETES RISK. If you’re worried about diabetes risk, you should be weight training. Also if you’re not worried about diabetes risk . . .

I recommend reading both Gary Taubes and Mark Rippetoe. But you knew that.

HE CHOSE. . . POORLY: The Blogger’s Defense Team Goes on the Offensive Against Team Kimberlin.

RECKLESS DISREGARD: Video: Obama campaign now pretending it didn’t know details of steelworker’s story — after featuring him in two ads. “So eager is lifelike talking-points robot Stephanie Cutter to keep the campaign’s fingerprints off the cheap lies in the PAC ad that she claims at 4:00 below not to know the facts about when Soptic’s wife got sick or when she died. Minor problem: The campaign itself featured Soptic in not one but two ads several months ago and had him tell the story of his wife’s death after he lost his insurance during a conference call with — ta da — Stephanie Cutter. You’ll find the audio of that below too; look out for Cutter’s cameo at the very end.”

HOW’S THAT HOPEY-CHANGEY STUFF WORKIN’ OUT FOR YA? (CONT’D): Appeals Court OKs Warrantless Wiretapping. “The federal government may spy on Americans’ communications without warrants and without fear of being sued, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday in a decision reversing the first and only case that successfully challenged President George W. Bush’s once-secret Terrorist Surveillance Program.”

They told me if I voted for John McCain . . . oh, Hell, you know the rest.

21ST CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: “Does He Want to Be My Friend or My FWB?”

JOURNALISM: Politico Catches Obama Campaign In Lie… and Buries It.

So Politico is doing worse than CNN?

SPACE: First moonwalker Neil Armstrong ‘doing great’ after heart surgery.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: 10 Smart Things I’ve Learned from People Who Never Went to College.

AT AMAZON, bestsellers in Diet & Weight Loss.

POPULAR: Ryan Budget Popular by 52-37 margin.

IMAGES: Drug Tunnels in Nogales.

LEGAL EDUCATION UPDATE: St. Louis University Dean Resigns, Charging Bad Faith: “It is the ultimate irony that a Jesuit university would operate so far outside the bounds of common decency, collegiality, professionalism and integrity. I simply cannot be part of, and I assure you I will not be complicit with, an administration that can’t be trusted to act honestly and in the best interests of its faculty, staff and students.” Wow.

THE WORLD WIDE WEB TURNED 21 YESTERDAY. Which means that InstaPundit has been around for over half the time the Web has existed.

IF YOU’RE IN THE AREA, Chris Peterson will be speaking at Stanford on nanotechnology tonight.

SO I FINISHED JOHN RINGO’S QUEEN OF WANDS YESTERDAY, and the resemblance to Charlie Stross got greater toward the end. Ringo’s series is heading toward its own version of CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN, though as I mentioned, I think I prefer his worldview to Stross’s.

RECYCLING: 9 novel ways to reuse a novel (or any other book).

21ST CENTURY QUESTIONS: Should Pro Gamers Be Considered Pro Athletes?

UPDATE: Link was bad before. Fixed now. Sorry!

AIRPORT SECURITY: X-Ray Scans at Airports Leave Lingering Worries.

HARD-HITTING MEDIA: Sun-Times Columnist Rahm Emanuel Praises the Awesome Job Mayor Rahm Emanuel is Doing.

WALTER RUSSELL MEAD: California: Blue Twilight on the Pacific.

Last year, the Supreme Court made waves when it ordered California to release tens of thousands of inmates from its overcrowded prisons on the grounds that the cash-strapped state was keeping them locked up under inhumane conditions. The Supreme Court order has forced California to repurpose county jails—which are intended for short stays, often by people awaiting trial—into makeshift prisons for those with long-term sentences. Now many of these jails are facing severe overcrowding. . . .

Once again, California’s dysfunctional governance has utterly failed the state’s residents. California can’t afford to enforce its own laws: an absurd and even insane position for a state to be in. California needs laxer laws that lock fewer people up, or it needs a bigger prison budget but there are no sane grounds on which the status quo can be defended. Forced by the US Supreme Court to do something, the state has acted with its characteristic fecklessness and passed the buck: handing the problem off to local governments, which, we should add, are facing serious fiscal problems of their own and are ill-equipped to deal with new prisoners.

California is in a hole but can’t seem to stop its compulsive digging. Schools, universities, prisons, pensions, cities and towns: the state has lost the ability to manage even the most basic elements of communal living. But foie gras is now illegal there, grandiose plans for white elephant fast trains built with borrowed money waft through the air, and the state continues to boost the self esteem of affluent and cause-oriented gentry liberals by scattering scarce resources to the four winds, hunting unicorns when the cupboard is bare.

As Philip K. Howard notes, government is a “deviant subculture.” In California, it’s just more deviant than most. I would suggest that the foie-gras bans and high speed rail enthusiasm are efforts by the California governing class to distract voters — and even itself — from its inability to address the basics adequately.