RALPH BENKO: The Power Of Drudge: A Little Civics Lesson For Janet Napolitano And Barack Obama. “If Mr. Obama vaguely wonders why so much of the public so mistrusts the government there’s a little civics lesson for him, too, here. Mr. President? Contrast the laxness of a federal agency with the alacrity of Subway in responding to public opinion. Discuss. Secretary Napolitano also ought to be deeply penitent for her backhanded slur of Drudge.”

FROM ABC NEWS: A Timeline of IRS Tea Party Harassment.

DOES CONGRESS LACK TO POWER TO BAN INTERSTATE COMMERCE? Barry Friedman & Genevieve Lakier: ‘To Regulate,’ Not ‘To Prohibit’: Limiting the Commerce Power. They’re mostly talking about marijuana, but this has obvious relevance to things like guns.

IN THE MAIL: From Elizabeth Scalia (The Anchoress), Strange Gods: Unmasking the Idols in Everyday Life.

STANLEY KURTZ: Swarthmore Spinning Out of Control (With Videos). “Swarthmore’s activists signaled a radicalization of their movement on May 4 when they forcibly seized control of an open Board of Managers meeting, issued demands and ejected conservative students, while Swarthmore’s President Rebecca Chopp stood by and did nothing. Video of this ugly incident has been passed around the Internet as if it’s something to brag about.”

EXODUS: “Disenchanted members of Gov. Cuomo’s administration, embarrassed by the worsening government scandals and convinced that Cuomo won’t be president, will soon leave their jobs — just as the governor is stepping up plans to run for re-election next year.”

FRANK J. FLEMING: “I think this IRS episode demonstrates that the left should focus on cleaning out all its extremist scum before worrying about the right.”

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Colleges Paying The Price For Expensive Facilities.

Due to the abundance of easily-available government loans, colleges have had little reason to compete on price, instead choosing to lure students through expensive projects like those seen in the video above. But we’re starting to see early signs that students are becoming more sensitive to price, which could spell trouble for schools that invested heavily in white elephant projects like these.

In addition to the points about frivolous college spending, the interview hits on a number of other themes we’ve discussed here at length, including the rise of MOOCs, the challenges facing many liberal arts colleges, and the appeal of programs that reward students for what they learn rather than how long they spend sitting in classrooms.

Indeed.

STUART ROTHENBERG: Obama Administration Heading for a Tough Few Weeks.

AT AMAZON, top summer picks in Tech Accessories.

Also, today only: Save 50% on Select Koss Headphones.

INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY: Obama’s Biggest Deficit Is Trust. “He’s simply not seen as an honest broker. Public opinion polls show he’s also having a hard time convincing the American people he’s sincere.”

IRS SCANDAL UPDATE: Rep. Issa: IRS apology to Tea Party groups ‘not an honest one.’

On Friday, the IRS apologized for targeting the groups, saying it was a decision made by career employees in an Ohio office in an effort to streamline the review process. The disclosure has led to heated criticism from Republicans, who are vowing investigations into the matter. The White House was also critical, as Press Secretary Jay Carney called the actions “inappropriate.”

A report on the matter from the Treasury watchdog overseeing the IRS is set to be made public this week.

But a leaked draft report was obtained by the Associated Press Saturday. The AP said the report found that senior IRS officials were aware of the targeting as early as 2011.

“They used key words to go after conservatives,” said Issa. “This is something where you have to institute changes to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

“There’s got to be accountability,” he added.

Prosecutions and firings would be a good start. Also, zeroing out the IRS’s conference budget. Hit ’em where it hurts . . . .

UPDATE: Report: IRS Also Targeting Debt Critics.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Prof. Stephen Clark writes: “The overt politicization of IRS audits would seem to argue for simplifying the tax collection process. Cue Steve Forbes: If the code were so simple that tax forms were the size of postcards, there would be far less need for the services of people prone to abuse the audit process.” Indeed.

A DEMOCRATIC SUCCESS FOR PAKISTAN: “The election was widely hailed as a landmark of democratic progress: One elected government succeeded in completing a full term and prepared to hand off power to another elected government, a first in Pakistan’s history. . . . ‘Pakistan should now be treated as, if not a fully democratic country, then at least a reasonably democratic country,’ said military affairs commentator Talat Masood, a retired three-star general.”

TRAIN WRECK UPDATE: WaPo: Health insurance tax ‘scares the daylights’ out of some small-business owners. “It disproportionately hits individuals and small-business owners, the people who have been hurt most by these challenging times.”

MARK STEYN: “After marrying her progeny into the royal houses of Germany, Russia, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Greece and Spain, Queen Victoria was known as the grandmother of Europe. The inbreeding among Obama’s court and its press corps is more like one of those ‘I’m my own grandpaw’ deals.”

GEORGE WILL: Benghazi attack was not “a movie review conducted with rocket propelled grenades.”

Related: Whistleblower Hicks, a Democrat, voted for Obama and guess who else? “Gregory Hicks, who served as deputy chief of mission in Libya during the Sept. 11 terrorist attack, voted for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in the 2008 primary election and Barack Obama in the last two general elections.” Nah, he’s still a rightwing shill. Gotta be.

Related: Sen. McCain calls Benghazi a ‘cover-up.’

Also: Joseph Curl: Watch out for Petraeus in Benghazi scandal. “Jay Carney looked almost ashen Friday as he took the podium to face a suddenly invigorated press corps. Of course, the public briefing came after a private session with ‘reporters who matter,’ a sure sign the White House is in full hunker-down mode — and, more precisely, terrified. . . . With the White House putting all blame on the agency, expect push back this week — nuclear push back. Gen. David H. Petraeus, the former director forced to resign after a sex scandal, is a dangerous man to the Obama administration. Mad and intent on getting even, he’s already talking, telling one reporter the talking points were “useless” and that he preferred not to use them at all. The floodgates will open this week, and by the end of business Friday, the scandal will be full blown.”

Well, stay tuned.

SALENA ZITO: Obama, Democrats Misfire on Guns. “Part of the problem is how the bill was pushed by Obama and his political arm, Organizing for America: People who own guns were condemned in shrill, strident terms that puzzled people who own guns, and even those who don’t.”

VIOLENT, ABUSIVE, CONTROLLING, PROFLIGATE: “[P]eople who are infatuated with government… have no realistic idea of what an awful husband the government really is.”

MICKEY KAUS: What About Clinton’s IRS? “I always thought the number of Bill Clinton enemies audited by his Internal Revenue Service was a bit high to be coincidental. When Clinton accuser Paula Jones was audited in 1997, Clinton’s press secretary Mike McCurry denied White House involvement . . . . We now know, of course, that you don’t need direct White House involvement to politicize the IRS, at least for Democrats. The underlings know what to do! The idea that they are apolitical professionals was always a myth. It’s even more of a myth now, in the era of Daily Kos and Greg Sargent.”

Plus: “Big government will always mean giving bureaucrats some control, and these bureaucrats will always tend to be Democrats. If they aren’t restrained by the apolitical civil service ethic, then they will always tend to harrass conservatives and Republicans.”

YEAH. IT’S ALSO TREMENDOUSLY WRONG. NYT: I.R.S. Focus on Conservatives Gives G.O.P. an Issue to Seize On.

GEORGE WILL ON THE IRS’ TEA PARTY ATTACKS: “How Stupid Do They Think We Are?”

Related: IRS Scrutiny Was Deeper Than Thought. “Government investigators have found that the Internal Revenue Service scrutinized conservative groups for raising political concerns over government spending, debt and taxes or even for advocating making America a better place to live, according to new details likely to inflame a widening IRS controversy. The latest details about the IRS handling of applications for tax-exempt status by tea party, patriot and other conservative groups in recent years were provided to congressional investigators by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration. The findings were reviewed Sunday by The Wall Street Journal.”

Also: Washington Post: IRS targeted groups that criticized the government, IG report says. “The new revelations are likely to intensify criticism of the IRS, which has been under fire since agency officials acknowledged they had deliberately targeted groups with ‘tea party’ or ‘patriot’ in their name for heightened scrutiny.”

Plus: “The focus will now become whether or not IRS commissioner Doug Shulman knew about the questions when he testified that no Tea Party groups were being targeted for unfair scrutiny in front of Congress in 2012. The report doesn’t shay whether or not Shulman was informed about the Tea Party questioning, but it does show the IRS’s chief counsel was. It’s standard procedure for the counsel and commissioner to discuss this sort of thing before a Congressional hearing.” (Bumped).

MATTHEW CONTINETTI: From Benghazi to Boston, the Obama Administration avoids the truth about terror.

FOR PROPAGANDA EFFECT, MOSTLY: Why is the mainstream media ignoring the fact that Gun Violence is Decreasing?

Since most Americans who support gun control wrongly believe that gun violence is increasing, accurate reporting would probably destroy the movement.

RON RADOSH: Reassessing Victoria Nuland’s Role in the Benghazi Cover-up: Was the CIA Trying to Set Up the State Department?

CLIMATE CHANGE: Ice Cores Reveal Green Arctic. “Analyses of sediment cores show that Arctic summers 3.6 million years ago were a good 8 degrees C warmer than they are today, and supported Douglas Fir and hemlock.”

Heck, during what used to be called the “climatic optimum” of around 5,000-6,000 BC we had trees growing on the shores of the Arctic Ocean, and inhabitants wore something that looked a lot like grass skirts.

And in a tangential note, if I were really rich I’d relocate some polar bears to the Antarctic, and some penguins to the Arctic, just to make life easier on future generations of schoolkids.