ST. PATRICK, without the green beer. “The facts about St. Patrick are few. Most derive from the two documents he probably wrote, the autobiographical Confession and the indignant Letter to a slave-taking marauder named Coroticus.”

COMPUTERS: Design hindsight from the tail-gunner position of a WWII bomber. “As I began to research the origin of the P-4 analog computer, I learned that (a), the computer was originally designed as part of a central fire control system for the remote control of bomber gun turrets primarily for the B-29 and B-32 bombers to be built by Sperry and General Electric.”

CONGRATULATIONS TO Blogger Of The Year Katie Pavlich.

ROGER KIMBALL: More Rot From The EU, Cyprus Edition.

BYRON YORK: In defense of GOP consultants: It’s the candidates’ fault. “What major failing of the Romney campaign, for example, can be laid solely, or even for the most part, at the feet of the consultants rather than the man who hired them? And in a larger sense, did consultants create the weak 2012 GOP primary field? Did they cause Mitch Daniels not to run?”

SHOVEL READY: Lockheed Martin Throws More Dirt On Malthus’ Grave. “Cheap, clean water may soon be available for the whole planet. According to Reuters, defense contractor Lockheed Martin has developed a filter that will hugely reduce the amount of energy necessary to turn sea water into fresh water. The filter, which is five hundred times thinner then others currently available, lets water pass through but blocks all salt molecules. It will use almost 100 times less energy than other methods for making salt water drinkable, giving third world countries another way of expanding access to drinking water without having to create costly pumping stations.”

Well, this is the 21st century, after all.

UPDATE: Reader Joel Mackey writes: “That filter has huge implications for fracking and water disposal in the oil and gas industry.”

And reader Kevin Murphy emails: “Couldn’t hurt in Los Angeles either, which is 20 million people living in a desert amid decreasing water supplies. But the Greens will probably find something wrong with it.”

IN THE 21ST CENTURY, it’s becoming impossible to hang up the phone.

But actually, hanging up even an old-style phone didn’t physically end the connection, but just told the central office switch to do so. And eavesdroppers at the phone company switch could tell it to ignore the hook position, allowing them to listen to whatever the phone could pick up.

UPDATE: A couple of readers say I’m wrong about this, and perhaps I am, but that’s my clear recollection. I also remember as a kid hanging up the phone and having it not disconnect the call on a few occasions.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Ron Muir writes:

On the subject of PSTN telephones and the network, as an “old” telephone guy. The systems allow the person originating call (Call Control) to terminate it by hanging up (pushing down the switch hook), the person receiving the call can hang up (push down the switch hook) but the call will not terminate until the caller hangs up. The new digital systems with SS7, change the dynamic slightly and make it an option for the originating exchange carrier to recognize the receiving caller to hang up (effect Call Control).

PSTN means “Public Switched Telephone Network.” Meanwhile, reader Douglas McKinnie emails:

What you have described is two unrelated issues —
There are times when the central office doesn’t register the change in impedance that indicates you have hung-up, and so the call remains connected even though your instrument is switched off. Picking up the handset again reveals that the line and call are still active.

The second issue is the eavesdropping bit. The old USA Model # 500 telephones typically had 4-wire (2 line) cords and 4-pole hang-up switches. The way they were designed, hanging up would switch OFF the handset and allow the ringer to remain connected. The other wires had use if a second line was required, for signalling functions such as the message light on hotel phones, and for certain functions of party lines so that the right house would ring.

Now, the ringer was to some extent microphonic, so it is in theory possible that someone at the CO could listen to conversations that way. They would have to be loud enough to move the ringer coil in relation to its unintentionally magnetized core.

The more likely issue is that somewhere along the line someone “happened to” just connect the 4-pole double-throw switch such that hanging up disconnected the handset from the normal two wires of the telephone line, and connected them to the other two unused wires. Then, anyone with access to the building telephone wiring could listen across those two wires to hear conversation through the on-hook telephone handset.

I recall reading about one government agency that decided to check, and found most of their phones wired that way.

Hmm.

AT AMAZON, bestsellers in “Ladylike Dresses.” I dunno, some of them look like they might not pass the CPAC Dress Code. . . .

Also, Shooting Supplies.

And, today only, The Hangman’s Daughter mysteries, 99 cents on Kindle.

ENERGY: Obama touts energy production his administration has hindered.

resident Obama praised the growth of the U.S. energy sector during a visit to Argonne National Laboratory in Lemont, Il., on Friday, crediting his administration’s “all of the above” energy policy for increased oil and gas production.

“We produce more oil than we have in 15 years. We import less oil than we have in 20 years,” he said. “We’re producing more natural gas than we ever have before — with hundreds of thousands of good jobs to show for it.”

Those numbers are true. Between fiscal years 2010 and 2012, total U.S. oil production rose by about 1.1 million barrels per day over fiscal year 2007, and natural gas production rose 20 percent from 2007 to 2012.

What the president failed to mention is that the growth he is so proud of has taken place in spite of his administration’s energy policy, not because of it.

A recent study by the Congressional Research Service found that all of the increased production from fiscal years 2007 to 2012 took place on non-federal lands.

Kinda cheesy.

Related: Did Obama Just Block Keystone? “So the Obama administration could green-light the pipeline, file a report that stops short of calling Keystone a major global-warming hazard, and still find the project delayed for years by environmental groups bringing court challenges under the new NEPA guidelines. In this scenario, headlines loudly proclaiming Obama’s approval of Keystone would shield him from Republican attacks. Simultaneously, the president could mollify the left by claiming credit for guidelines that effectively allowed his allies to stop the pipeline.”

UTAH REMATCH? Mia B. Love Hires Top Hatch Strategist for Matheson Rematch. “After a 1-point loss in Utah last year, Saratoga Springs Mayor Mia Love is actively laying the groundwork for a second challenge to the sole Democrat in the state’s delegation, Rep. Jim Matheson. In preparation for a bid, Love has hired former state GOP Chairman Dave Hansen, who was widely heralded last year for successfully managing the re-election campaign of Sen. Orrin Hatch.” I noticed via Twitter that she got a standing ovation at CPAC.

ANN ALTHOUSE not impressed with Gail Collins’ attack on Ted Cruz. “This woman-defending-woman column ends with a recipe metaphor. Is that good gender politics? It resonates with what I think is Collins’s effort to make us see this interplay between 2 U.S. Senators in terms of a man patronizing a woman.” If you can’t respond to a guy who’s been in the Senate for ten weeks, when you’ve been in the Senate forever, without playing the “damsel in distress” card, then you shouldn’t be in the Senate. So I guess the takeaway from Collins’ piece is that DiFi should resign in favor of someone more . . . masculine.

Plus, from the comments: “The media is testing their modes of attack against Cruz. Is he wacky, scary, a McCarthy; arrogant etc. They have to find the right theme that will stick so they can destroy him.”

And they’re so anxious to destroy him because he’s Latino.

HEARTBREAKING: K Street Hiring Chill Leaves Members Cold.

It’s not as if they’re setting up outside of Union Station with “Will Work for Food” signs, but the cadre of ex-members from the 112th Congress is finding a lukewarm hiring market downtown.

“It has been more challenging this year than in any year I can remember, and I’ve been doing this for 18 years,” said Ivan Adler, a lobbyist headhunter with The McCormick Group.

K Street shops, many in revenue decline for the past couple of years, can no longer afford the luxury of a high-priced former member. Senators usually don’t entertain offers worth less than $1 million, and House members’ threshold is typically about $700,000. And it’s an investment with no guaranteed payoff. Ever.

Hey, maybe the revolving door is slowing even without my tax reform proposals.

TED CRUZ SERVED UP RED MEAT AT THE CPAC CLOSING. Hard to believe he’s only been a Senator for ten weeks.

Meanwhile, Rand Paul won the CPAC straw poll. He’s having quite a run, too.

MY THE K-12 IMPLOSION gets a really nice review from Walter Russell Mead:

The modern American public school system is a product of the late 19th and early 20th century transformations of American society. An agricultural society based on small farmers became a manufacturing society in which most people lived in cities. And the great flood of immigration between 1880 and 1923 filled America’s burgeoning cities with tens of millions of people who didn’t speak English and didn’t know much about the country to which they had moved.

The educational system was a way of helping kids adjust to a world that was radically different than the world many parents understood or could prepare them for. Teachers were professionals with knowledge not available to the average person—and they were considerably better educated than the parents of most of their pupils.

That is no longer true; many parents these days have just as much education as teachers if not more. The progressive era model of a bureaucratic school organization staff by life-tenured employees is no longer a good fit for our increasingly entrepreneurial and job-hopping society; it prepares kids (badly) at great expense for a world that no longer exists.

Our society is becoming more diverse, and different families need very different things when it comes to educating the kids. Uneducated single moms in crime ridden inner city neighborhoods need one kind of help when it comes to helping their kids get a good start in life; families where both parents have been to college want something quite different.

American education is going to change far more than most of us expect; Glenn Reynolds has done a magnificent job of showing just how urgently change is needed and how sweeping it is likely to be.

Read the whole thing. Then buy a copy and send it to your school board — and your congressman.

MARK STEYN: The Axis of Torpor.

JIM TREACHER: To close out the week, a special message for Michael Bloomberg.

MATT VESPA: “This madness has got to stop between the ACU and GOProud. It’s becoming distracting.”

POLL: American Public Increasingly Sympathetic Toward Israel.

WHY IT’S GOOD to own a gun.

WELL, THERE’S DAVID BROCK AND THAT ILLEGAL GLOCK: James O’Keefe Asks Media Matters to Sign Anti-Violence Pledge at CPAC… Media Matters Refuses.

AT AMAZON, coupons galore in Home & Kitchen.

Also, up to 30% off Rosetta Stone language software.

WHERE IS ADMIRAL GAOUETTE? Here’s a Navy Times story from November 4.

Also: Navy Denies Admiral Removed Over Libya. I don’t know what happened here, but it seems to be another of those things in which the press isn’t interested in doing any digging.

MICKEY KAUS: “It looks like the attempt to turn CPAC into a pro-immigration-amnesty rally has been somewhat less than a rousing success.”

WALTER RUSSELL MEAD: Europe Puts Its Faith In Blanche DuBois. “Bank runs in Europe? The EU made them a little bit more likely this weekend, and as Cypriots stampede for the shrinking number of ATMs still handing out cash on the island, Italians, Greeks and Spaniards are also beginning to wonder if, with interest rates effectively at zero and confused politicians running Europe’s bank systems, the mattress might just be the safest place for their money after all.”

This haircut-to-depositors violates all the traditional thinking about avoiding bank runs.

UPDATE: Just the beginning?

Meanwhile, a reader emails: “This is pure speculation for the moment, but what would you want to bet that later analysis will show a rash of bank withdrawals by Cyprus-and-EU government affiliates and their families before the announcement of the tax on deposits?”

ANOTHER UPDATE: “It will be interesting to observe depositor behavior in places like Lisbon and Athens Monday morning.”

MORE: Here’s the soundtrack.