PHOTO ESSAY: At home with female hunters.

NEWS FROM ACADEME: Professor Orders Students to Support Gay Rights.

JAMES PETHOKOUKIS: The asterisk president: Did the IRS’s Tea Party suppression get Obama reelected?

THE COUNTRY’S IN THE VERY BEST OF HANDS: IRS Agents ‘Accidentally’ Discharged Guns 11 Times. “Special agents at the IRS accidentally shot their firearms 11 times between 2009 and 2011, and at least three of the cases ‘may have resulted in property damage or personal injury.’ Agents actually fired their guns accidently more often than they intentionally fired them in the field, according to an audit by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA).”

ROLL CALL: Coburn: Treasury’s Still Stonewalling IRS Conference Spending Inquiry.

Related: IRS, Groaning Under Weight of Sequester, To Pay $70 Million In Bonuses.

“SMART DIPLOMACY” UPDATE: Walter Russell Mead: White House Fiddles, Middle East Burns: Will Obama Make W Look Like a Bismarck?

The region is unraveling and American policy is in deep disarray. Our strategic options are getting worse, and the stakes are getting higher. When former President Bill Clinton is warning that his successor risks looking “lame” or like a “wuss” or a “total fool,” it’s a safe bet that the Kremlin and Tehran aren’t impressed by White House statements. Meanwhile the Obama administration seems to be locked into a sterile, short-term policy approach driven by domestic considerations; it is following the path of least resistance to a place that in the end will please no one and is increasingly likely to lead to strategic disaster.

An insightful article by the Democratic-leaning Bloomberg columnist Jeffrey Goldberg offers a deeply unsettling view of a Syria foreign policy process gone off the rails. If Goldberg has the story right—and he usually does—Secretary Kerry and the bulk of the White House security team want the President to authorize a no-fly zone and other strong measures in Syria, in part because they fear that American dithering in Syria is empowering the hardliners in Tehran and that by avoiding a small war in Syria now the White House risks a much uglier confrontation with Iran not all that far in the future. But the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs wants nothing to do with it, pointing to the difficulties and costs of the military mission. (One suspects that playing a role in this skepticism is military suspicion of a civilian leadership seen as indecisive and ready to order missions without providing the political backing necessary to bring the public along. The military fears—with some reason, alas—that the same White House that ordered it into action on day one would deep six the mission on day ten and throw the blame on the brass if things didn’t work out and the public wanted to bail.)

As Goldberg tells it, the biggest problem for the administration is that its early aggressive, poorly judged rhetoric that Assad “must” go now makes it impossible to avoid Obama’s looking like an irresolute bluffer if the Butcher stays put.

Not looking so good. I just wish Obama would show the steely determination and merciless follow-through that he displays with regard to his domestic political enemies when dealing with America’s foreign enemies.

Plus: “We don’t see many signs that anybody—not the Arabs in the Gulf, not the Europeans, not the US—has any idea what to do about Egypt’s death spiral, but the consequences for regional security (as well as European security, if it produces hordes of refugees) could be even greater than the consequences of the Syrian madness. The administration does not seem to recognize just what kind of superstorm is taking shape in a region that has been vital to global economic and political stability since the Second World War.”

TIME TO TALK: Heritage, Levin Call For Immigration Debate. Debate is the last thing the Gang of 8 wants. Well, except maybe for scrutiny, which would be even worse. Can we have a rule that all bills must be read on the floor in their entirety before a vote?

NIALL FERGUSON: The Regulated States of America: Tocqueville saw a nation of individuals who were defiant of authority. Today? Welcome to Planet Government.

THE INSTA-WIFE AT THE HUFFINGTON POST: 8 Reasons Men Don’t Want To Get Married. “If you want more men to marry, it needs to be a more attractive proposition.”

AT AMAZON, markdowns on bestselling multitools.

Also, today only: 60% Off Men’s Sport Coats and More.

TAXPROF ROUNDUP: The IRS Scandals, Day 42.

“SMART DIPLOMACY:” National Journal: Obama’s Turbulent European Vacation: With vague pledges and backtalk from Merkel and Putin, the president shows how far America’s standing with Europe has fallen.

UPDATE: “US President Barack Obama repeatedly addressed Chancellor George Osborne as Jeffrey during the recent G8 summit, according to media reports.”

FACEBOOK PHOTO SHOWS KENNEDY GIRL SHOOTING BABY SEALS.

MASHA RIFKIN REVIEWS the Insta-Wife’s new book, Men On Strike. Plus, an Insta-Wife interview.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE, LEGAL EDUCATION EDITION: Washington & Lee’s Dismal Placement Results Question Experiential Learning Push for ‘Practice-Ready’ Lawyers.

JAMES TARANTO: Sex, Lies and the War on Men: The rights of the accused are under vicious attack.

All this viciousness was in the service of denying that there is, as we wrote in yesterday’s article, a “war on men.” Well, imagine if a prominent feminist journalist wrote about the “war on women” and dozens of conservative male writers responded by subjecting her to similar verbal abuse. Would that not be prima facie evidence that she was on to something? If the answer is yes–and we’d say it is–then either the same is true in our case or the sexes aren’t equal. (Select one or both of the above.)

We can take the abuse. In fact, in this instance we delight in it, not only because we see the humor but because it proves us right.

But the underlying subject matter is far from funny. The objective of these ideologues is to destroy the lives of men. . . . This appetite for punishment regardless of facts, this contempt for the rights of the accused, is worthy of a lynch mob. That is an inflammatory analogy, but we employ it advisedly. The victims of lynching were not infrequently men accused of sexual violations.

Read the whole thing.

BLOOMBERG: IRS Employee Used Politics Test Executive Said Didn’t Exist. Lies and more lies, from lying liars.

IT’S NOT PARANOIA. IT’S BATTLESPACE PREPARATION BY A COMPLICIT MEDIA. The Atlantic: Paranoia Strikes Deep: The Press and Rand Paul — The absurd lengths journalists have gone to portray the Kentucky senator as if he’s hiding something dangerous.

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR MITT ROMNEY, OUR ADMINISTRATION WOULD BE FULL OF CLUELESS RACISTS. AND THEY WERE RIGHT! Hilarious: Dimwit Chuck Hagel Asks Indian Professor if He’s a Member of the Taliban. Video at the link.

UPDATE: Reader Krishnan Chittur emails: “I am indeed a member of the TALIBAN: The Association of Learned Indians with Brain power Against Neanderthals.”

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Do Unpaid Internships Lead to Jobs? Not for College Students. “The common defense of the unpaid internship is that, even if the role doesn’t exactly pay, it will pay off eventually in the form of a job. Turns out, the data suggests that defense is wrong, at least when it comes to college students. For three years, the National Association of Colleges and Employers has asked graduating seniors if they’ve received a job offer and if they’ve ever had either a paid or unpaid internship. And for three years, it’s reached the same conclusion: Unpaid internships don’t seem to give college kids much of a leg up when it comes time to look for employment.”

CARRIE LUKAS: Actually, Women Believe In Personal Responsibility.

AOPA DEMANDS ANSWERS ON AIRCRAFT SEARCHES: “With a growing number of reports from law-abiding pilots stopped by armed federal agents on the ramp, their aircraft searched by federal agents, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Customs and Border Protection remains silent, and outrage is building. AOPA is questioning CBP’s authority to conduct the searches, and demanding a response from officials at the highest level. There has been no meaningful response to date from CBP to Freedom of Information Act requests filed months ago by AOPA and affected pilots.”

Plus: “We were given no justification for such extreme delinquency in meeting the statutory requirement to respond within 20 business days.”

CROWDS: Tea Party Rally in Washington May Have Drawn Bigger Crowd than Obama Speech in Berlin.

UPDATE: Twice As Many?

VICTOR DAVIS HANSON: Lies Subvert Democracy. “Truth is the lifeblood of democracy. Without honesty, the foundations of consensual government crumble. If the Internal Revenue Service acts unlawfully, our system of citizens’ computing their own taxes implodes. Yet Lois Lerner, one of the IRS’s top officials, would not answer simple questions about her agency’s conduct during congressional testimony, instead pleading the Fifth Amendment. Any taxpayer who tried that with an IRS auditor would end up fined, if not in jail. Almost everything that IRS officials have reported about the agency’s unlawful targeting of conservative groups has proven false. IRS malfeasance was not limited only to the Cincinnati office, as alleged, but followed directives sent from higher-ups in Washington. Lois Lerner confessed to the scandal only through a rigged public query by a planted questioner, designed to preempt an upcoming critical inspector general’s report. There is legitimate dispute over both the number and the purpose of former IRS commissioner Douglas Shulman’s visits to the White House and nearby executive office buildings, but he did his credibility no good by snidely remarking to Congress that at least one of those visits was to take his kids to the White House Easter Egg Roll.”