SPLC-RELATED HATE CRIME UPDATE: Prosecutors seek 45-year sentence for Family Research Council shooter. “Prosecutors recommended in court papers that the Herndon man who shot a security guard at the Family Research Council be sentenced to 45 years in prison. Floyd Lee Corkins II went to the conservative organization’s Chinatown-area headquarters on Aug. 15 with the intention of killing as many people as he could, according to court documents. But his plan to commit mass violence was thwarted by Leonardo Johnson, a security guard shot by Corkins.”

Meanwhile, there’s that SPLC “Kill Map” that Corkins used. SPLC still hasn’t taken it down. How many more hate crimes must they facilitate before they see reason?

PICTURES FROM THE Boston Bombing shootout. Great pics, but I recommend that when bullets are flying you seek a secure part of your home, rather than standing by windows.

POLITICO: Taxes: President Obama’s budget would hit middle class.

HuffPo: Obama Budget Plan Results In ‘Back Door’ Tax Increase For Middle-Class Households: Analysis.

Hey, remember that pledge not to raise taxes on people making less than $250,000? Me neither.

BARACK OBAMA’S ORGANIZATION expecting another gun control vote before 2014 elections?

STUART ROTHENBERG: The He Said, She Said of Gun Control: Get Over It. “The deep disappointment coming from the White House, gun control advocates and the parents of Newtown, Conn., at the demise of the Manchin-Toomey Senate compromise gun bill is understandable. But some of the rhetoric following the amendment’s defeat has been over the top.”

Related: Support For Gun Control Bill Falls Below 50%.

WENDY KAMINER: ‘We Don’t Cower in Fear’: Reconsidering the Boston Lockdown.

THE HILL: Lawmakers vow bombing investigations. “Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Monday promised an exhaustive House inquiry into whether the FBI should have more rigorously investigated terror suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev before last week’s Boston Marathon bombing. Boehner said the House Judiciary, Intelligence, and Homeland Security committees would all be looking into how closely the FBI investigated Tsarnaev, who was killed Friday after he and his younger brother allegedly carried out a string of bombings and shootings that terrorized Boston.”

PUNISHING THE VOTERS FOR THEIR INTRANSIGENCE: Flight Delays as Political Strategy: The FAA furloughs traffic controllers rather than cut other spending.

Just remember, the sequester was Obama’s idea.

K-12 IMPLOSION UPDATE: Seven Not-So-Fun Facts About the Costs of Public Education.

PAULA BOLYARD: How I Evolved on Guns During the #BostonPoliceScanner Manhunt.

If confronted with an armed intruder or assailant, shooting to maim or firing a warning shot may not be an option, so a gun owner must wrestle with the moral implications of shooting someone to death. I searched my heart and realized that in the heat of the moment of an attack, I wasn’t sure what I would do with a gun in my hand. I knew that could be more dangerous than being unarmed; it wasn’t worth the risk.

But all that changed early Friday morning. Along with 80,000 others around the world, I found myself glued to the live-action police drama being played out online. I first noticed the tweets with the hashtag #BostonPoliceScanner late Thursday evening and was soon engrossed in the manhunt, listening to the officers on the ground in Watertown and Cambridge and simultaneously following the tweets from the worldwide audience. Throughout the night, a community of sorts formed as I began to recognize Twitter handles and together we “watched” law enforcement officers create a perimeter and lay down a grid so they could search the neighborhoods of Watertown. We listened as they responded to calls from residents who “heard something” in their sheds or thought they saw a “guy with a backpack” walking down the street. This was repeated dozens of times throughout the night. When police broadcast their location, many listeners typed the address into Google Street View and so could see the streets and even houses they were responding to.

It was both surreal and very real at the same time. It was a strange combination of social media and reality show with the knowledge that life and death were on the line. . . .

I realized at that moment that the police cannot protect me from the Dzhokhar Tsarnaevs of the world.

The best they can do is tell me to lock myself in my home while they search for the bad guy. Though the residents of Watertown (and the surrounding greater-Boston area) were held in a state of near-martial law, the best most of them could do was huddle in their homes, hoping the police would take their 3 a.m. call and come running to rescue them before the terrorist killed them. . . . I realized right then that if I were holed up in my house while a cold-blooded terrorist roamed my neighborhood, I wouldn’t want to be a sitting duck with only a deadbolt lock between me and an armed intruder.

Neither would I.

TIM BLAIR: Racing Ahead. “How confident was the Sydney Morning Herald that the Boston bombers were associated with the Tea Party? So confident that last Friday it ran this teapot terror image.”

ED DRISCOLL: Off the Rails: Mad Men and American Liberalism in 1968.

THOMAS JOSCELYN: Investigating The Boston Bombers’ Foreign Ties.

AT AMAZON, coupons galore on Kitchen Goods.

I WOULD HAVE TAKEN HIM FOR A CATCHMAN: Anthony Weiner, Pitch Man? ‘Hating Breitbart’ Team to Use Disgraced Pol to Promote Film.

WAIT, WHAT ABOUT THAT PLEDGE OF NO TAX INCREASES FOR FAMILIES MAKING LESS THAN $250,000 A YEAR? White House Endorses Internet Sales Tax.

“Any form of tax increase” — “not any of your taxes.” Well, watch the video and decide for yourself.

KURT SCHLICHTER: Americans Run Toward The Fire.

JOURNALISM: Randy Shilts’ “Patient Zero” — just a publicity stunt?

AT AMAZON, 25% or more off on outdoor generators.

Also, Safety Equipment & Supplies.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: Six Ways To Defeat Campus Censors.

I’M CONFIDENT THAT THEY WON’T LISTEN: Advice To The Gun Control Movement On How To Get Better.

MY USA TODAY COLUMN FOR TOMORROW IS UP: Guns, Gay Rights, And Giving The Tie To Liberty.

RAND SIMBERG: Is It Really “Anti-Science” To Go Paleo? No.

CHICAGOLAND: Arrested 396 times, woman knows how to work the system. “Rolon recognized Shermain Miles because he’s seen her more times than he can count — drunk, half-naked, cursing and, on one occasion, lunging at another woman with a dinner fork. Since 1978, Chicago Police alone have arrested Miles 396 times, mostly on the North Side — under at least 83 different aliases. Those arrests include 92 for theft, 65 for disorderly conduct, 59 for prostitution-related crimes and five for robbery or attempted robbery. The frustrating truth: The system — strapped by overcrowded prisons and cuts to mental health funding — hasn’t been able to save Miles from herself or to help the communities she menaces. Nothing has worked. Not jail. Not prison. Not countless psychological exams for the woman described as being ‘acutely psychotic.'”

The perils of deinstitutionalization. Might as well give Clayton Cramer a plug here.

MICHAEL MUKASEY: Boston Bombing Was Jihad.