NEWS YOU CAN USE: You’ll never be able to open Champagne like Alton Brown.

SOMETHING TO CHEER YOU UP: The Little Book of Big Enlightenment.

ANSWERING THE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS: Where do the biggest coffee-lovers live? Portland, Maine, tops the list (but residents of Jackson, Mississippi, couldn’t care less).

REAL COURAGE: The Great Unveiling: Iranian Women Are Ditching Their Head Scarves on Facebook.

IS THIS THE POLITICAL THEATER YOU’VE BEEN WAITING FOR? They say Bill Clinton is going to do a public apology to Monica Lewinsky. I look forward to the scenery chewing.

ADDED: At my home blog — where I also blogged this rumor — a commenter named Biff said: “If true, we have clear confirmation of the genesis of Monica’s recent re-emergence.” That would be Theory #2 out of the 5 theories I posited 2 days ago. I took a poll, and 50% of the respondents chose Theory #2.

ALSO back at the home blog — sorry!! — I’m soliciting scripts for Bill’s (possibly) forthcoming apology. From a commenter I particularly like — the commenter I married, Meade — here’s a proposed apology script I particularly like:

I apologize for letting you, in my moment of weakness, seduce me. And I’m sorry that it led Hillary to calling you a “narcissistic loony toon.”

As you know, I had been brought low by the then recent deaths of my mother, Hillary’s father and our close friend Vince Foster, as well as by political attacks from Republicans. I’m sorry for Republicans being, you know, Republicans. I don’t know why there even has to be Republicans.

A psychologist Hillary talked to suggested that the roots of my infidelity lay in my childhood, particularly the struggle between my mother and my grandmother over who would have the privilege of raising me. Obviously, I won the struggle.

I regret that Rand Paul has accused me of using my position of authority to take advantage of young women in the workplace. None of them were that young.

You, I, and Hillary all know that my (consensual) affair with you was not a power relationship and was not sex within any real meaning (standup, liedown, oral, etc.) of the term. So, sorry — you’ll have to get over it.

Anyway, sorry. Or, you know, whatever.

FROM EUGENE VOLOKH: The linked-to article is at New Study Reveals 89% Of Nation’s Food Stamps Squandered On Junk Food and a bunch of things don’t quite check out — the Malbeck Data Institute doesn’t seem to have a Web page, the author’s supposed books don’t show up on Amazon, and the quotes in the story have that made-up feel to them, if you know what I mean.  In any case, I wanted to flag this just in case. — It’s quite possible I’ve been taken.  It agreed with my internal prejudices and the fact that ebooks you give away for free always get terrible reviews!

RACISM STRAIGHT UP: Bloomberg Writer Attacks Black Senator as ‘Affirmative Action’ Token.

STONE KNIVES AND BEARSKINS: Last night, I got back to California after my behind the scenes work on the Duranty Awards in New York, after a delayed flight from JFK to San Francisco that began with an hour and a half on the tarmac, proceeded by six hours in flight, inside an aging Boeing 767 with one bathroom out of service, no Wi-Fi, and plenty of turbulence. (The stewardess  told us that all planes on this route will have Wi-Fi starting in June; at which point, I assume our plane will be sold by American Airlines to the Grace L. Ferguson Storm Door & Airline Company.) After finally getting home, in order to achieve maximum slumber, I watched last Sunday’s Mad Men episode before calling it a night. Two observations:

There’s something almost Warhol-esque in setting a show built around a dynamic, visually-themed industry in America’s most vibrant city, in what was arguably America’s most convulsive decade of the 2oth century and making it so grindingly boring.

However, I did enjoy the plot point of the latest episode, in which Sterling-Cooper’s management is pulling out their writers room and turning it into a hovel for its newly acquired giant 1969-era IBM mainframe. I can’t wait to see what incredible programming they’ll be doing on that; or the punch cards and tractor-fed paper that go along with it.

It reminded me of the first computer I ever used – an Altair 8800 that a math teacher at St. Mary’s Hall installed in his classroom in 1976, after assembling it from a kit. It was hooked up to a used teletypewriter, a paper tape reader, and eventually — to really immanentize the eschaton –a black and white TV and cassette player. We mostly played Wumpus, Hammurabi, Lunar Lander and Star Trek on it, but it definitely did feel like future had arrived.

What was the first computer you started on? What programs did you run on it? Let me know in the comments.

Oh, and speaking of great moments in pioneer computing…

Have you ever thought to yourself “what’s the most 90s thing that could ever feasibly exist”? Well, wonder no more. pic.twitter.com/AqLx5uJtL2

— Jehan Ranasinghe (@Maustallica) May 9, 2014

And yes, it’s real – if not exactly spectacular.

RUNAWAY CORPORATIONS: The problem of corporations fleeing the U.S. for more tax-friendly venues is the topic of today’s Wall Street Journal op-ed by my former boss, Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), the Chair of the Senate Finance Committee. Wyden pledges to engage in a bipartisan effort to reform the tax code, which he asserts must include both a lowering of the corporate tax rate as well as plugging of corporate tax loopholes.

Normally, I’d be skeptical of Democrat overtures on tax reform.  But having worked for Wyden in the past, I know he’s a straight shooter and is genuinely interested in accomplishing bipartisan consensus.  I hope the Republicans are willing to reach across the aisle and work with him; it’s a rare opportunity to get something done.

IF KEVIN DURANT’S MVP SPEECH MADE YOU CRY, then stop what you are doing and go to The Federalist to read Rachel Lu’s explication of why what he said is profoundly important to the Right. Trust me, this is one of the most important articles the Right media will publish in 2014.

BTW, if you haven’t bookmarked The Federalist, you should. Some great writing and thoughtful analysis there every day. Oh, and they also published something I wrote a few weeks ago: “Can the Right displace the established media? It already has.”

I BET THEY’RE ASLEEP IN NEW YORK. I BET THEY’RE ASLEEP ALL OVER AMERICA: The Nigerian terror group Boko Haram reflects the general Islamist hatred of women’s rights. When will the West wake up?, asks Ayaan Hirsi Ali in the Wall Street Journal.

PELOSI: We Haven’t Decided Whether to Boycott the Benghazi ‘Kangaroo Court.’

HOW MUCH WOULD YOU PAY TO SEE ERIC HOLDER SPROUT WINGS AND FLY? Getting President Obama’s Attorney General to do that is the compulsory predicate to jail time for Lois Lerner.

CHANGE: Syrian Rebel Wants a New Ally: Israel.

JACK’S BACK: Five Reasons To Get Excited About 24: Live Another Day.

A PEN, A PHONE, AND SOLAR PANELS ON THE WHITE HOUSE:   Seriously.  The Obama Administration is preparing to bypass Congress–again— and issue a slew of Executive Orders to fight global warming “climate change.”  Michael Bastasch over at Daily Caller reports:

Obama will order executive agencies to push a slew of new programs to promote solar power, green jobs training and subsidize investing in energy efficient appliances and equipment. Obama will also announce a plan to complete solar panel installations on the roof of the White House.

The president will make his announcement Friday at a Wal-Mart in Mountain View, California and outline 300 “private and public sector commitments” to reduce carbon dioxide, which is released into the atmosphere through the burning of hydrocarbons and through natural processes.

When will Congress start defending its constitutional prerogative to make the laws?

“ISSUE ADVOCACY IS NOT A HEALTHY PART OF OUR POLITICAL PROCESS,” says a blogger in the aftermath of Judge Randa’s injunction stopping the John Doe investigation of the Wisconsin Club For Growth, and David Blaska reacts: “Is that not what he does on his blog… what I do on my blog, what The New York Times and MSNBC do daily? Advocate for issues?”

WAR ON BOYS: California City Council Interested in Power to Arrest 5-Year-Olds for Serial Bullying.

THE GREAT SOCIETY AT FIFTY: Nicholas Eberstadt explores what LBJ wrought, at the Weekly Standard:

Unlike, say, an old-age pension awarded after a lifetime of work, a bestowal of charity or aid to the indigent is a transaction that establishes a relationship of dependence. As a people who have prized their independence, financial as well as political, Americans throughout history have attempted to avoid dependence on “relief” and other handouts. Recovery from the Great Depression was corroborated by the great decline in the numbers of Americans on public aid: In 1951, the commissioner of Social Security was pleased to report that just 3.8 percent of Americans were receiving public aid, down from 11.5 percent as recently as 1940. But with the War on Poverty and its successor programs, such dependency has become routine. The United States today is richer than at any previous juncture​—​yet, paradoxically, more Americans than ever before are officially judged to be in need. Welfare dependence is at an all-time high and by all indications set to climb in the years ahead.

As LBJ aide Joseph Califano Jr. told USA Today in March, “This world that we’re living in today is more Lyndon Johnson’s world than the world of any other president.”

At least until the bill comes due.

TAMMY BRUCE: Why Hillary Fears Monica:

Nothing says “war on women” more than the feminist liberal Democratic hero having her feminist liberal Democratic media sycophants go on the offensive to destroy an inconvenient woman.

Indeed.™

CLYDE, HARVEY, MABEL, MARJORIE… some old-timey names are moving up on the newly released “Change In Popularity From 2012 To 2013” chart.

IN SOUTH L.A., YOUNG GAY BLACK MEN ARE MIRED IN OLD TABOOS — AND HIV, the L.A. Weekly reports:

How had Maldonado been infected? “I was involved with someone who … ” he says, struggling to find the words, “was not as health-conscious, and did not take the proper safety measures with their life as I did and was not aware of their status. Someone that I trusted. And it just happened.”

He discovered he was infected just two months before his 25th birthday. As Maldonado well knew, HIV infections in the United States have been dropping in nearly every subgroup that is commonly tracked, with one exception: The numbers have been ticking up steadily among black men, ages 14 to 24, who have sex with men.

“I became the statistic,” he says.

More and more, the face of HIV in Los Angeles and the United States is that of the young, black gay man. That trend has set off an exceedingly touchy debate among scientists, doctors, social workers, politicians, activists and gay men: Why?

Read the whole thing.

HIGHER EDUCATION “SAY WHAT!?” ALERT:   George Leef has another great column over at Forbes.  This time he explains how Uncle Sam’s Obama-inspired “generosity” approach to student loan policies not only encourages more debt but also low-paying, public sector work.

All I’m going to say is that I put myself through law school using student loans, and I will pay them off sometime this year (!)  Equity aside, the feds weren’t so  “generous” to me; I didn’t have  loans “forgiven” because I took a relatively low-paying job as a law professor.  Somehow, through prudence and hard work, I’ve managed to pay my debt back and have a comfortable life.  And if they had offered such forgiveness, I would have felt like a loser.  “Generosity” like this is often perceived by the capable as a handout to the incapable.  To borrow a phrase from Frederick Douglass, “your interference is doing [] a positive injury.”