BUT REMEMBER, VOTER FRAUD IS JUST A G.O.P. MYTH: Cincinnati poll worker indicted for voting for Obama six times.

I NOTICE THAT BOTH HE AND ANDREW CUOMO REALLY STRESSED THE GUN-CONTROL THING, WITH SIMILAR RESULTS: McClatchy Poll: Obama’s Post-Election Political Capital ‘Largely Gone.’

DON’T BE RIDICULOUS. SOUTH CAROLINA WOULD NEVER ELECT A GAY SENATOR. A GOProud Challenge To Lindsey Graham?

FINANCIAL IRRESPONSIBILITY: “If you want a sense of just how massive the nation’s debt problem is, consider this: The U.S. added $226 billion in new debt in just the 35 days since President Obama missed the legal deadline to submit his budget. That’s more than the government will spend this year on education, homeland security, law enforcement, housing aid, energy and the environment, combined.”

TED CRUZ POLITELY INDICATES that he doesn’t take John McCain’s attacks seriously. That’s got to hurt. But then, he has a very different style than McCain: “For a man in the news a lot, Cruz has avoided plenty of press interviews and turned down Sunday show invitations. Instead of racing to the cameras, he has shaken things up mostly by doing his job as a senator.”

NEW YORK POST: Fair Share Unpaid:

Those who make the rules should play by them. Especially a White House that lectures the rest of America about the importance of paying your “fair share” of taxes.

So we were struck by IRS reports that no fewer than 40 aides to President Obama still owe the federal government a combined $333,485 in back taxes. . . .

For all its sermons on fairness, this administration has never seemed too bothered when its own people somehow forget to send the IRS the check they owe.

Tim Geithner became treasury secretary despite failing to pay Social Security and Medicare taxes. Ron Kirk’s unpaid taxes didn’t stand in the way of his becoming US trade representative. Tom Daschle, Obama’s pick for Secretary of Health and Human Services, was another delinquent — though his nomination did go down.

Obama says, “We need to change our tax code so that people like me . . . pay our fair share of taxes. Most Americans would call that common sense.”

Given this administration’s double standard for its own employees, most Americans would probably call that hypocrisy.

Taxes are for the little people. And the unconnected.

A CRUCIAL POINT: ‘There’s a difference between being the party of free markets and the party of existing businesses.’

CHANGE: House GOP would cancel health care reforms, trim $5t in spending.

UPDATE: Prof. Stephen Clark emails: “Ryan’s budget proposal is no more serious than the budget being fronted by Senate Democrats. Both are merely aspirational and entirely political. When will either party get serious? Probably not until the voting public makes a decision about what it wants. Until then, it will be CR’s and continued drift. Hard as it may be to believe, much less accept, an insufficient number of citizens believes that there is a problem requiring that they, as individuals, give up anything. Until then it will be circuses – anything to avoid discussions of finance. This is the true legacy of the Bernanke era.”

DOUGLAS ADAMS’ BIRTHDAY WAS YESTERDAY, and The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy is on sale.

ROLL CALL: Portman Quietly Positions Himself, but for What?

HAS PIERS MORGAN BEEN ANYWHERE NEAR A COMPUTER LATELY? Celebrities Hacked.

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR MITT ROMNEY WE’D HAVE A LILY-WHITE CABINET. AND THEY WERE RIGHT! CBC leader concerned Obama has named no blacks to new Cabinet. “Attorney General Eric Holder, appointed in Obama’s first term, remains the Obama administration’s only black Cabinet-level appointee. According to a Politics365 analysis released last week, that’s the fewest by any president over the last 38 years.”

Maybe the Black Caucus should send over some binders full of black people.

HEY, JUST LIKE HE IS FOR EVERYONE ELSE LOOKING FOR WORK: Politico: Dems’ big 2014 obstacle: President Obama.

ATTITUDE ADJUSTMENT: Rand Paul made being against the drones… cool.

TECHNOLOGY: Who said old TVs were useless? Analogue televisions can be transformed into solar-powered DEATH RAYS that will burn anything in its path at 2,000F.

AUSTERITY: Government Advertises for Nearly 2,600 New Jobs Since Sequestration. “This includes 107 new positions at the Department of Homeland Security, which has freed illegal immigrants citing budgetary constraints.” It’s all about priorities.

WANT A GENUINE THIRD PARTY? GOP Ready To Cave On Gun Control. They’d be idiots to cave. They’re winning this issue. But they are the Stupid Party.

EARTHQUAKE PREP, LOS ANGELES: Residents Urged To Prep For ‘Two Weeks On Your Own’ On Quake Anniversary.

Related: Here’s a post on low-budget disaster-prep. Also, what should be in your bug-out bag. Also, stuff to keep in your car or SUV. More here.

SHOUTING LAGER, LAGER, LAGER — THEN RUNNING OUT OF BREATH: Danny Boyle to make Trainspotting sequel with original cast in middle age.

AT AMAZON, bestsellers in Men’s Athletic Shoes.

Meanwhile, nobody tell The Manolo what’s #1 in Men’s Shoes overall. He’d cry.

PUBLIC SCHOOL INSANITY: My USA Today column for tomorrow is up.

IF THIS PANS OUT, IT’S BIG NEWS: Astrobiologists discover fossils in meteorite fragments, confirming extraterrestrial life. “Researchers in the United Kingdom have found algae-like fossils in meteorite fragments that landed in Sri Lanka last year. This is the strongest evidence yet of cometary panspermia — that life on Earth began when a meteorite containing simple organisms landed here, billions of years ago — and, perhaps more importantly, that there’s life elsewhere in the universe.” Similar reports in the past have been inconclusive, so stay tuned.

UPDATE: James Lileks sends this negative take.

JOHN HINDERAKER: The War Against The Second Amendment Has Only Just Begun.

Note that I discuss some of these issues in my Second Amendment Penumbras piece.

WE’RE STILL LEARNING how antibiotics work.

SEARCH: Microsoft’s Bing Now Can Find Local Businesses That Aren’t Too Crowded.