CLARENCE THOMAS GETS a standing ovation at Harvard. Video at the link. (Bumped).

IF ONLY WE COULD FIGURE OUT THE, ER, KEYSTONE OF THIS PROBLEM: WaPo: Gas Prices Are On A Mysterious Climb. But perhaps we can refine our analysis, if not our oil: “Several refineries have been shut down for routine maintenance, and in the eastern United States, several refineries simply went out of business in the past year.” Due to EPA restrictions, in large part.

HOPEY-CHANGEY: Aaron Swartz files reveal how FBI tracked internet activist.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: The Overlooked Health Benefits of Semen.

AT AMAZON, Warehouse Deals on Video Games.

#WARONWOMEN: Michelle Obama Stranded by Her Man as Barack Goes on a Golfing Weekend.

CHANGE: Congress To Consider Better Asteroid Detection.

THE NEW ECONOMY: It Is Twenty Times Easier To Get Into Princeton Than To Get A UK Part-Time Coffee Barista Job. “Just as in the US, The Daily Mail notes unemployment is actually falling according to official figures, but the demand for relatively low paying jobs tells a different story, as unsuccessful candidates include senior managers with over 15 years experience in retail.”

HOW’S THAT HOPEY-CHANGEY STUFF WORKIN’ OUT FOR YA? (CONT’D): Walmart Customers Have Disappeared. Will They Take the Economy With Them?

ADVERTISE YOUR INDIE MUSIC, on Helen’s Page.

#WARONWOMEN: Bob Beckel: What’s a little mythical campus rape? Are you supposed to shoot your date? .

Related: Greg Gutfeld slams outrageous lib rape ‘tips’; ‘The rapist should be crapping, not the victim.’

I’M NOT LIKING THIS: New coronavirus can infect human lungs as easily as cold virus: study. “British authorities announced Tuesday that another person has died from infection with the new coronavirus as European scientists revealed the new virus easily infects the cells of the airways of the human lung. In fact, the new coronavirus is as adept at infecting the cells of the upper airways as two cousin viruses — the one that caused SARS and one that causes common colds, the new study reported. All three are members of the coronavirus family. . . . All of the infections appear to have a link to the Middle East, with Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Qatar being the three countries from which most cases have arisen.”

MESSAGING: Joe Biden: If you want to protect yourself, get a shotgun.

SALESMANSHIP: McCain defends immigration plan to angry residents.

ABC NEWS: GOP Won’t Cave to Obama’s Shaming.

The so-called sequester seems more unavoidable than ever as lawmakers enjoying a nine-day recess in the comfort of their districts watched President Obama shame them publicly on television, part of the president’s effort to pressure Congress to strike a deal to delay the first wave of arbitrary spending cuts scheduled to hit at month’s end.

The president today called on Congress to close tax loopholes to raise half the amount in a package of alternative savings to offset the sequester. But in a statement after the president’s address, House Speaker John Boehner rejected his proposal and reiterated that any revenue achieved by closing loopholes should be utilized to lower individual rates via comprehensive tax overhaul, not to pay for more spending.

“Tax reform is a once-in-a generation opportunity to boost job creation in America,” Boehner, R-Ohio, said. “It should not be squandered to enable more Washington spending. Spending is the problem, spending must be the focus.”

With about $2.7 trillion in revenue in 2013 and about $3.8 trillion in spending, the $85 billion sequester cut this year represents a 2.2 percent reduction in spending in FY2013, or less than one-half of one percent of the growing $16.5 trillion federal debt.

Five percent across the board, year-over-year. Repeat until spending is under control.

LEADERSHIP: Obama Works the Phones to Calm Tensions on Immigration Plan. “After a Presidents’ Day weekend whodunit of who leaked what and why — not to mention a he-said, she-said back-and-forth on the Sunday shows and in news releases — President Obama took to the phones Tuesday afternoon to quell rising tensions with Senate Republicans after a draft of a White House immigration plan was somehow leaked to the news media.”

YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK: Department of Homeland Security Target Supplier Includes Pregnant Women & Old Men For Target Practice.

21ST CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: 8 Dating Rules That Have Changed Since You Were Married & Divorced.

THIS COULD BE USEFUL: Nanocapsules Sober Up Drunken Mice: Wrapping alcohol-digesting enzymes in a nanoscale polymer allows them to quickly reduce blood alcohol content.

JOE SALAZAR UPDATE: Rape Comment Backfires For Lawmaker.

“SHE TREATS HER WOMB LIKE A CLOWN CAR.”

KEEPING YOUR BEER COLD with a propane cooler.

STEVEN GREENHUT: Dorner Manhunt Reveals Police Contempt for Public Safety.

Police typically say that their top mission is to protect “public safety.” That’s the lingo. But the recently concluded manhunt for former Los Angeles Police Department officer Christopher Dorner, accused of murdering four people after releasing a manifesto decrying his 2008 firing from the force, suggests that concern about the public’s actual safety sometimes is fairly low on the list of police priorities.

Last weekend, police opened fire on a 71-year-old newspaper carrier and her 47-year-old daughter who had the misfortune of driving a pick-up truck police thought might be Dorner’s. The Los Angeles police detectives who opened fire on them, putting two bullets in the older woman’s back, didn’t do much double checking. The carriers’ truck was a different make and color from Dorner’s.

As the women’s attorney told the Los Angeles Times: “The problem with the situation is it looked like the police had the goal of administering street justice and in so doing, didn’t take the time to notice that these two older, small Latina women don’t look like a large black man.” This could be written off as a sad fluke, except that 25 minutes later different officers opened fire on a different truck—once again getting key details wrong. Can’t officers at least check the license plate, and issue a warning, before opening fire?

“Nobody trains police officers to look for one of their own,” said Maria Haberfeld, a police-training professor at John Jay College in New York, according to the Web site News One. “I wouldn’t want to be in their shoes and I don’t think anybody else would.” We all understand the situation. But saying that we wouldn’t want to be “in their shoes” is no excuse for such dangerous behavior. The police wouldn’t excuse a member of the public for misusing a firearm, regardless of how stressed out that person felt.

Nope. An armed citizen who acted this way would be in jail now. Except that armed citizens seldom act this way.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Columbia Professor Strips Down To Underwear, Shows 9/11 Footage During Bizarre Physics Lecture.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: Irwin Redlener on surviving a nuclear attack.