RECOVERY BUMMER: The GDP (Gosh-Darn Pathetic) Economy, whose faint pulse is taken by Tom Blumer at PJM.

Why is it so gosh darn pathetic? Overregulation is Killing America’s Can-Do Spirit, Ed Morrissey writes at The Week.

BARRY’S MINIONS BRING THE PITCHFORKS: “My administration,” the president threatened bank CEOs in April of 2009, “is the only thing between you and the pitchforks.”

Flash-forward to today: “Obama Unleashes the Left,” Daniel Henninger writes at the Wall Street Journal.

As the late  Kenneth Minogue warned in 2010, “We must face up to the grim fact that the rulers we elect are losing patience with us.”

Their anger will only increase between now and November.

Related:  The left’s Privilege Police versus freshman student Tal Fortgang.

PROBABLY NOT A BAD IDEA: NATO troops in Eastern Europe could be permanent after Crimea crisis.

IS THERE NOTHING IT CAN’T DO? How coffee can save your sight: Chemical in the drink prevents degeneration of the retina due to glaucoma, ageing or diabetes.

WHO LET THE DOGS OUT?:  The Obama Administration.  The Wall Street Journal’s Daniel Henninger documents the Obama unabashed, full-court press to end free speech, aided by far left/Marxist university faculty and their indoctrinated students.  It is kind of beautiful that universities are feeling the Administration’s wrath.  But instead of fighting back, expect university administrators to cave and lick the Great Leader’s shoes.

THE IRS SCANDAL, DAY 364, from TaxProf blog.

FIGHTING BOKO HARAM ON TWITTER: Operation Pouty Face. And just a reminder of the link that Ed Driscoll put below.  When it counted, Hillary’s State Department Refused to Brand Boko Haram as Terrorists.

VETERANS AFFAIRS ADMINISTRATION SCANDAL UPDATE: “Administration tries keeping down the volume on scandal over the VA waitlist deaths, but the tragedy isn’t confined to Phoenix,” PJM Washington Editor Bridget Johnson writes.

BREAKING:  PROSECUTORS’ APPEAL IN “JOHN DOE” INVESTIGATION FOUND “FRIVOLOUS”:  The prosecutors who have been ruthlessly pursuing conservative supporters of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker in a secret “John Doe” investigation have been smacked down by U.S. District Judge Randa again today. Randa had issued a prelimary injunction late Tuesday halting the investigation, finding that the conservative plaintiffs, including the Wisconsin Club for Growth, had established a “substantial likelihood of success” on their claims that the investigation was designed to squelch their First Amendment rights.  Earlier today, Randa declared he was “absolutely convinced that the defendants’ [prosecutors’] attempt to appeal this issue is a frivolous effort to deprive the court of its jurisdiction to enter an injunction.”

Just another example of liberal/progressive conception of “free speech”:  for me, but not for thee.

JOE BIDEN AND THE SHOTGUN TRIAL, at the New York Sun:

It’s going to be illuminating to see whether the defense calls Vice President Biden in the case of the shotgun shooting of the teenaged thief. The case is the subject of a riveting dispatch in the New York Times. It involves the killing of a foreign exchange student named Diren Dede, who was in the process of trying to rob the home-garage of a resident of Missoula, Montana, when a motion sensor awoke the owner, Markus Kaarma, who got his shotgun and fired four cartridges into the garage, killing the hapless youth.

We are happy to leave it to the courts of Montana to try the facts in the case. We are struck, though, by echoes — not mentioned by the Times — of Vice President Biden. It was Mr. Biden who, in the gun debate that followed the Newtown, Connecticut, tragedy, urged people to get a shotgun. “If you want to protect yourself, get a double-barrel shotgun,” he said. He allowed that he told his wife, Jill, a physician, that if there’s ever a problem, she should go out on their balcony and “fire two blasts outside the house.”

That was too reckless for the more sober National Rifle Association (for one thing, it would leave Dr. Biden with an empty shotgun). And the two situations aren’t perfectly analogous. According to the Times, Mr. Kaarma fired his shotgun not outside the house but into the garage. He had, the Times reports, been troubled by burglars before. Mr. Kaarma may be able to cite Montana’s recent “castle-doctrine” law, which gives persons like Mr. Kaarma more discretion in defending their homes. It will be a learning moment.

Read the whole thing.

A “LIKE” ATTACK, on Nazis.

SO MUCH FOR THE SCIENCE IS SETTLED: “Women who never sunbathe during the summer are twice as likely to die than those who sunbathe everyday, a major study has shown.”

I’m not sure if that’s also true for guys, but I suspect I’ll be maintaining my trademark year-round translucent moontan — if only for the sake of contrarianism.

BACHELOR PAD ECONOMICS: Aaron Clarey’s recent book on the economics of “Enjoying the Decline” makes an appearance in the latest edition of Chris Muir’s “Day By Day” comic:

For my interview with Aaron discussing both Bachelor Pad Economics, and his earlier book on making the most of life in the Obama era, Enjoy the Decline, click here.

‘LIGHTEN UP!’ Pelosi ‘Pretty Confident’ China Not Overtaking U.S. Economy.

ECUADOR: PATTON BOGGS TO PAY CHEVRON $15 MILLION: From Fausta Wertz, who writes, “Maybe, just maybe this will give pause to anyone considering to engage in fraudulent legalfare against U.S. corporations.” Read the whole thing.

ASKING THE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS: Why Are Taxis Almost All Yellow?

(Via Maggie’s Farm.)

WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE? Hillary’s State Department Refused to Brand Boko Haram as Terrorists — Under Hillary Clinton, the State Department repeatedly declined to fully go after the terror group responsible for kidnapping hundreds of girls.

THEY SHOULD: CNN worries Hilary Clinton may have jeopardized run with gun control statements.  Another thing they should worry about is that their preferred candidates can only win if they lie about their beliefs.  Maybe, contra-Marx the people aren’t with you?  And you’re the ones standing athwart history yelling ‘stop’?

WAR ON MEN: “How College Sex Became Obama’s War on Men,” from Liz Peek at the Fiscal Times.

UNEXPECTEDLY: This Simple Graph Compares Reagan’s and Obama’s ‘Recoveries’. All the people I know who are in business for themselves already know this in their guts (and in their bottom line.)

DOG DAY AFTERNOON: Video: Most adorable highway chase ever.

NOT EVEN HIDING IT ANYMORE: FEC Chairman Warns The Left Will Not Stop Until It Enlists the Power of Government to “Regulate” Political Speech by Conservative Media, and Even Conservative Blogs.

The First Amendment: It was fun while it lasted.

“LIKE THE IRS TARGETING OF CONSERVATIVE NONPROFITS, the Wisconsin John Doe shows how campaign-finance laws have become a liberal weapon to silence political opponents. Prosecutors claim to be fighting the risk of corruption from ‘dark money’ in politics. But their enforcement attempts, done in secret and unrestrained by Constitutional guardrails, have become far more politically corrupting.”

As Judge Randa put it, and very well, “the larger danger is giving government an expanded role in uprooting all forms of perceived corruption which may result in corruption of the First Amendment itself.” Let’s hope the Seventh Circuit is as wise.