SCREW JOB: Phone-Unlocking Remains Illegal.

NOT ANOTHER GUY, not another guitar!

AT AMAZON, pre-Black Friday deals on Musical Instruments.

Also, deep discounts on open-box and used electronics.

Also, a reminder: InstaPundit is an Amazon affiliate. When you do your shopping through the Amazon links on this page, including the “Shop Amazon” tab at the top or the searchbox in the right sidebar, you put a little money in my family’s pocket at no cost to yourself. Just click on the Amazon link, then shop as usual. It’s much appreciated!

PHOTO OF THE WEEK: Check out the book a Republican state senator in TN gave Kathleen Sebelius today in Memphis. Hilarious! She appears to be unamused.

BUT OF COURSE: ‘Sex Workers’ Embrace Obamacare at ‘Healthy Ho’s Party.’

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR MITT ROMNEY, BLUENOSES WOULD BE CRACKING DOWN ON WOMEN’S SEXUALITY. AND THEY WERE RIGHT! 3 Bikini Baristas Arrested At Washington Coffee Stand.

THE MICROBIOLOGY OF ZOMBIES. From epidemiologist Tara Smith.

WELL, THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY, YOU KNOW: DARPA Plans to Arm Drones With Missile-Blasting Lasers.

THE POLITICS OF BANDWIDTH: Comcast funding political groups to defeat Seattle Mayor who is getting gigabit fiber for Seattle.

HOW FEMINISM undermined itself.

AT AMAZON, deals on new sewing machines from Brother.

Also, deals on time-saving kitchen gear. Slow cookers, griddles, and more.

Plus, save on automotive cargo carriers.

AVOIDING THE POWER GRID with cheap fuel cells?

WHEN SETTING CROSS-COUNTRY DRIVING RECORDS is no longer glamorous.

HMM. PIERS MORGAN ALREADY BLAMING AN AR-15, NO DOUBT. At Least 3 Injured in LAX Security Checkpoint Shooting.

UPDATE: More here.

THINKING ABOUT HEALTHCARE.GOV’S SECURITY PROBLEMS: Ironically, the glitches may be the best security tool yet. “In fact, the site’s stability issues and lack of usability to this point may be its best security: Even hackers haven’t been able to get in long enough to make it work.”

STUPID OBSTRUCTIONIST REPUBLICANS . . . OH, WAIT: Gillibrand puts hold on Obama Navy nominee.

A BRIEF HISTORY of life on Mars. I was hoping for Dejah Thoris selfies.

I’D LIKE TO GET A RIDE IN ONE OF THESE: Son Of Blackbird. “In a detailed report in the Nov. 4 edition of Aviation Week & Space Technology, Senior Editor Guy Norris lifts the wraps on the SR-72’s cutting-edge design, including a propulsion breakthrough that would allow the aircraft to fly twice as fast as the Blackbird — six times the speed of sound — but still take off from and land on a runway like a conventional aircraft. Lockheed Martin and partner Aerojet-Rocketdyne have been working in secret for seven years on the concept, which centers on integrating an off-the-shelf turbine with a scramjet to power the aircraft from standstill to Mach 6.”

MICKEY KAUS: Bring On The Wise Men — But Are There Any? “The Obama administration is this close to being the object of one of the most vicious forms of condescension in the MSM arsenal: the Call for Wise Men. . . . But are there any Wise Men left? I’m not so sure. The most obvious wise men are Gergen himself, who’s too cliched even for the MSM to propose with a straight face, and Bill Clinton, whose interests don’t coincide completely with Obama’s and who wouldn’t take the job anyway. Bruce Reed is in the White House already! Al Gore has gotten too weird. Jody Powell died. Even the old wise men have been partially discredited.” When you have the worst political class in American history . . . .

Plus, from the comments: “The man who thought himself wise enough to write an autobiography once he turned 30 will not be able to find anyone wiser than himself.”

TAXPROF ROUNDUP: The IRS Scandal, Day 176.

RANDY BARNETT: Supreme Court Called ObamaCare Mandate A Tax; GOP Should Make Democrats Own It.

Remember, in 2009, the president emphatically denied to George Stephanopoulos that the Affordable Care Act imposed a tax increase. Yet, after the Supreme Court decision, going into the 2012 election, the White House again seemed to deny that the mandate was a tax, notwithstanding the administration’s argument to the Court.

Now, as the price for delaying the implementation of the court-created tax penalty, Republicans should demand truth in labeling. The Democrats in Congress must now admit they have imposed a tax on young and healthy Americans to get them to take the bad deal that is Obamacare. And any suspension of this tax must be scored by the Congressional Budget Office so the public knows the size of the tax increase that will be imposed on the American people when the delay ends and the tax kicks in. No longer will congressional supporters of the ACA be able to evade political responsibility.

On the other hand, if the Democrats insist that the penalty is not a tax, then they will be admitting that it is unconstitutional under the Supreme Court’s decision. If Congress contradicts what the administration told the Supreme Court, a new challenge can be brought under the precedent of NFIB v. Sebelius. The president, and those who supported this law, should now be forced to bear the political consequences of their legislative and litigation legerdemain. If Obamacare can only legally live by the tax, then its supporters in Congress must politically die by the tax.

Read the whole thing.

UPDATE: Updated with original URL.

SMART DIPLOMACY: Experts: Confidence in U.S. wanes.

YET AGAIN: Fracking Gets A Clean Bill Of Health. “The British government’s health agency is the latest body to give fracking a clean bill of health, in a move that should galvanize the country to act on its considerable reserves of shale gas.”

SOMETHING THAT CAN’T GO ON FOREVER, WON’T: Everyone Wants To Go To Export Heaven.

What’s interesting is that we’re having exactly the same ritualistic spats that we were having 10 years ago, when I first started writing for the Economist. Japan, China and Germany are entirely dependent on exports to keep unemployment to a low roar. The U.S. is running a persistent current account deficit and, in fact, hasn’t been in the black since 1990.

No one thinks this is sustainable. But none of the big players wants to end it, either; Americans aren’t ready to actually start saving like a grown-up nation, and the export powerhouses are desperately trying to accumulate a massive hoard of IOUs before their entire populations age into Centrum Silver territory.

Yet unlike Germany, Japan and China, the U.S. feels the need to actively argue in favor of its own position. China doesn’t go around trying to get other nations to export a quarter of their gross domestic product. In fact, China would rather not have the competition. But the U.S. has to complain. And I have to wonder if we don’t feel a bit guilty about our running tab with, well, the rest of the world. We’re like a drunk who wants to reform but knows he lacks the willpower, so he urges the bartenders to close down and take up haberdashery. Which is a good guide to how effective the whole thing is.

Promises that can’t be kept, won’t be. Debts that can’t be repaid, won’t be. Plan accordingly.