REMINDER TO SELF — ORDER MORE AMMUNITION: Just heard audio from Syrian rebel who says, “We have less ammo than what most Americans have under their bed.”

Also, I like us having that reputation.

UPDATE: A reader emails: “Pffft. No self-respecting American gun owner would be able to fit his ammo under the bed.” Well, you know . . . foreigners. You have to make allowances. Or maybe he just means the ready-use supply.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Kim Sommer writes: “Order more ammo? From where?” LuckyGunner.com!

MORE: Reader William Basow writes: “Actually, the auctions at Gunbroker offer bulk 9mm ammo much cheaper than Lucky Gunner. Just bought 1000 rounds of new, brass, Winchester 9mm ammo for $420, including shipping. (Bought at buy-it-now price rather than waiting out an auction.) Gunbroker is a site similar to e-bay, with seller ratings, etc. Great place to shop for firearms as well.” Never heard of that one, but okay.

INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY: Hillary Clinton’s Shameful Intimidation Of Gregory Hicks. “The secretary of state in the most transparent administration in history has her chief of staff warn a Benghazi whistle-blower to not spill the beans on Benghazi to a U.S. congressman.”

ANYBODY NOTICING A PARALLEL WITH THE IRS SCANDAL? Bloomberg Execs Knew Journalists Were Tracking Clients In 2011. Okay, maybe not. But I think this piece is excessively sanguine. I remember insider-traders using law firms’ car-service calls to gather data; there’s more information available here.

UPDATE: Ben Smith emails with the most amusing angle: “Bloomberg confessed the spying on air and got away with it because nobody watches Bloomberg TV.”

HOPE AND CHANGE: Shorter IRS: “Sorry about our massive abuse power while mining your data, but trust us with your health records!”

I’D PREFER A BOFORS GUN, PERSONALLY: How Massive Ships Defend Themselves From Pirates. But what’s this line? “Traditionally, countries have discouraged mariners from bringing firearms on board.” Well, it depends on how far back you count as tradition. . . .

MAXIM’S HOTTEST GIRL OF THE YEAR: Miley Cyrus?

POLITICIZING THE IRS: IRS anti-Tea Party scandal gets real — senior IRS officials aware of targeting. “This is getting real. Yesterday it was just some ‘low level’ employees involved. Now AP is reporting that senior IRS officials were aware of the targeting.”

Here’s the story: “A federal watchdog’s upcoming report says senior Internal Revenue Service officials knew agents were targeting tea party groups in 2011. The disclosure contradicts public statements by former IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman, who repeatedly assured Congress that conservative groups were not targeted. . . . The Treasury’s inspector general for tax administration is expected to release the results of a nearly yearlong investigation in the coming week. The Associated Press obtained part of the draft report.”

So that’s why they released the story early — they knew it was coming out anyway. (Bumped).

LAWPROF ACTION SHOT: Me running into the law school earlier today, to sign an urgently-needed student letter of recommendation. (Photo by the Insta-Daughter, who found it amusing.)

GOOD NEWS! New Flu Bugs: Too Lethal For a Pandemic? “Calculations by Dr. Boni and his colleagues show that with 60% mortality, H5N1 bird flu is still four times too lethal to be able to spread within a human population. In captive ferrets (the experimental animal of choice for flu research) it is rapidly evolving toward lower virulence. Ironically, the most worrying sign for a bird-flu pandemic would be if the virulence dropped significantly—then it could spread. There are signs this might be happening in Egypt.”

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Sallie Mae Profit Boosts College Endowments And Pension Funds As Students Pay More. “The previously unreported investments mean that education professionals are able to profit twice off the same student: first by hiking the cost of tuition, then through dividends and higher valuations on their holdings in Sallie Mae, the largest student lender and loan servicer in the country, which profits by charging relatively high interest rates on its loans and not refinancing high-rate loans after students graduate and get well-paying jobs.”

ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCE AND WEIRD CLAIMS IN THE AIR: OK, He Didn’t Cause Hurricane Katrina. But He Is Guilty of Fraud. “In the history of U.S. military research, there’s never been a project with such a combination of big science, high sleaze, and pure conspiratorial strangeness. Yet somehow, some way, the story of the High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program, or HAARP, just got sleazier and stranger — all thanks to an elderly physicist named Alfred Wong.”

CHINESE BILLIONAIRE JACK MA NOT SO BIG ON THE GATES PLEDGE: “This idea of giving your money out was not created by Gates and Buffett. It was created by the Communist Party in the 1950s!”

PHOTO GALLERY: Israeli Army Girls.

PRODUCT OF IGNORANCE: Poll: 64% of Gun Control Advocates Wrongly Think Gun Crime Up. “According to a Rasmussen poll released on Friday, while gun killings have plunged 39 percent since 1993, and non-fatal gun crimes have dropped 69 percent in the same period, those who want gun control think that gun crime is up. Rasmussen reports that only 7 percent of adults believe there are fewer gun owners in the country than there were 20 years ago – and more importantly, 64 percent of those who want more gun control think that gun crime has escalated.”

AT AMAZON, spring savings in Patio, Lawn & Garden.

Or, stay in your chair: Hot New Releases in Movies & TV.

Also, movie reviews in Amazon’s Armchair Commentary blog.

“I DON’T KNOW MUCH ABOUT PLANTS:” Marijuana mix-up: Brooklyn building superintendent, cops at first mistake tomato plants for pot.

LEGAL EDUCATION UPDATE: Law Prof: Let’s Scrap the ‘Gentleman’s C’.

21ST CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: The most popular day for moms to cheat on their husbands. “Here’s a brutal revelation about modern motherhood: the notorious pro-cheating site Ashley Madison (yes, the one where you can find the perfect person to have an affair with) announced that the biggest spike in women signing up for the site occurs on the day after Mother’s Day. In fact, last year, they saw a 439% increase in new women signups on that fateful Monday.”

100,000 DOWNLOADS MAY PROVE HIM RIGHT: Defense Distributed’s Cody Wilson On Being Told To Remove 3-D Printed Gun Plans: “We Win.”

READER BOOK PLUG: Reader Douglas Hufnagel writes: “Hey Professor Reynolds, I was wondering if I could get a book plug from you. I just released a new novella for 99 cents at Amazon. It’s titled An Endless Treasure and is a comedic adventure that starts with five central characters that could only generously be called heroes raiding a castle.” Done!

A GUIDE TO BACKYARD GRILLING GEAR.

I’ve now had the same Kenmore Premium grill for nine years. The electronic-ignition even still works, after I did a bit of contact-cleaning this spring.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Student Debt Slows Growth as Young Spend Less. “The anemic economy has left millions of younger working Americans struggling to get ahead. The added millstone of student loan debt, which recently exceeded $1 trillion in total, is making it even harder for many of them, delaying purchases of things like homes, cars and other big-ticket items and acting as a drag on growth, economists said.”

UPDATE: A reader emails:

It is likely to get worse – as their parents have less to spend on their behalf.

So far I have only spent to subsidize necessary health care and car down payment for adult offspring, and co-signed for their major purchases (mortgage, professional start-up). I hope it is enough to get them over the hurdle, because I’m about done, if I’m to fund my own retirement as well.

Indeed.

WASHINGTON POST: Playing Politics With Tax Records. “A bedrock principle of U.S. democracy is that the coercive powers of government are never used for partisan purpose. The law is blind to political viewpoint, and so are its enforcers, most especially the FBI and the Internal Revenue Service. Any violation of this principle threatens the trust and the voluntary cooperation of citizens upon which this democracy depends. So it was appalling to learn Friday that the IRS had improperly targeted conservative groups for scrutiny. It was almost as disturbing that President Obama and Treasury Secretary Jack Lew have not personally apologized to the American people and promised a full investigation.”

Remember, Obama joked about auditing his enemies in 2009. At the time, I warned about the damage to the “trust and voluntary cooperation of citizens upon which this democracy depends,” but Obama didn’t get much pushback elsewhere. Now, however, people need to be fired, and most likely prosecuted, to drive home the appropriate lesson. And Obama himself needs to be taken to task. The Post editorial is just a start.

IT’S A BAD ADMINISTRATION TO BE A WATCHDOG IN: Watchdog says government has tried to silence him on Afghanistan.