A BLOODY WEEKEND: In Chicago.

UPDATE: Reader John Steakley emails, “Obviously an elaborate hoax, since Chicago has no guns.” You do seem to get these 32 shootings this weekend headlines from places with strict gun controls, don’t you? It’s almost enough to make you lose faith in the whole enterprise.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Phil Manhard emails: “It’s a quagmire! If elected president, I promise to bring all Americans home from Chicago by the end of the year…” These people have been killing each other for decades. There’s nothing we can do to make things better. Our efforts will only strengthen the covert cross-border influence of the cheeseites from neighboring Wisconsin.

ANOTHER Anniversary. The U.S. did better than Powell expected on race, but it may be that we had more reserves to draw on than Britain possesses.

ROGER SIMON: The Washington Post in Desperation Mode.

UPDATE: A different kind of desperation at The New York Times? They’re related, though . . . .

THOUGHTS ON EARTH DAY, from Eric Scheie: “May Mike Godwin forgive me for the post I am about to write.”

Mike’s a pretty forgiving guy. But then, he’d have to be.

JEFF GOLDSTEIN on blog grammar.

MORE REVISIONIST HISTORY from MoveOn.org. We are in favor of the war in Afghanistan. We have always been in favor of the war in Afghanistan! Pay no attention to that petition in the Google cache!

THE D300’S BIG BROTHER: A review of the new Nikon D3.

NICK GILLESPIE: If You Care About Free Speech, Come to This Press Conference on Monday, April 21.

BUT HE SUPPORTS THE SECOND AMENDMENT! Bob Casey: Obama Would Probably Find DC Handgun Bill Constitutional. “Why didn’t Obama answer the question at the debate instead of weaving and bobbing? Was it because he didn’t want to alienate PA voters, many of whom favor strong gun ownership rights? And, did he fail to tell the truth?”

Yes, he did. And here’s another big roundup on the issue.

MORE ASUS NEWS: “Asus informed us this evening that the Eee PC 900 will hit the store shelves in the U.S. on May 12th. The Linux and Windows XP loaded version of this 8.9″ version of the Eee PC will both cost $549.” I’d like to do a comparison with HP’s Mini-Note, which’ll be out about the same time, and around the same price. It’ll be available with XP, too, and I have to say it looks cooler for whatever that’s worth.

FROM REFIGHTING THE 1960S TO REFIGHTING THE 1980S? Is that progress?

FEAR AND LOATHING at the Los Angeles Times.

PAM MEISTER SAYS that if the feds are going to investigate CEO pay they should investigate others, too.

I think, though, that she misses two fields ripe for investigation: Nonprofit pay, and the finances of elected officials, who seem to become a lot wealthier while in office than their government salaries can account for.

PRO-RIGHT-WING BIAS in the liberal media!

CONDI RICE MOCKS SADR AS A COWARD.

UPDATE: More interesting Iraq news rounded up here.

MARS VIDEO at Space.com.

A ROUNDUP OF AWARD-WINNING COOKBOOKS from the International Association of Culinary Professionals.

RICK MORAN: And the band plays on.

CRUSHING OF DISSENT at Thesaurus.com?

REPURPOSING “ANTI-TERRORISM” GRANTS:

Even though Memphis hasn’t suffered a terrorist attack, the city is using federal grants to fight crime, which might lead to the discovery of a terrorist suspect. Other cities are using federal money with similar programs.

Reading the whole story, it sure sounds like they’re just spending the money on stuff they do anyway, and calling it anti-terrorism because it “might lead to the discovery of a terrorist suspect.” Likewise, my posting of photos from Long’s Drug Store constitutes an anti-terrorism effort, since if there’s a terrorist eating lunch there, someone might recognize him. Where’s my federal money?

JULIA GORIN: Can Hillary out-pander Obama? Gorin suggests she should get back to her roots.

IN THE TORONTO SUN, MORE CRITICISM OF CANADA’S kangaroo-court “human rights” commissions:

What are we to make of the Ontario Human Rights Commission’s drive-by shooting of Mark Steyn and Maclean’s?

The OHRC ruled it did not have jurisdiction to proceed with a complaint filed by the Canadian Islamic Congress and some law students over an excerpt from Steyn’s book that appeared in Maclean’s titled “The future belongs to Islam.”

That would have been fine if that’s all the OHRC did, but out of the other side of their mouth they condemned the article for being racist and Islamophobic. Unfortunately they made these findings without holding a trial or hearing legal arguments or evidence from Maclean’s.

Silly me, I thought courts and tribunals were supposed to hear both sides before they ruled on the merits of a claim.

Not these tribunals. They’re all about silencing inconvenient truths, apparently . . . .

OOPS: “As of today, we’re taking bets to see how long it will take before people realize that “GPS” does not stand for ‘Auto Pilot.’ . . . Piloting a coach through the Washington Arboretum — as the GPS instructed him — the driver ignored, or didn’t see, or didn’t believe (take your pick) the flashing lights and sign warning him that his 11-foot-high bus was too tall for the looming 9-foot concrete overpass.”

IN THE MAIL: Gerard DeGroot’s The Sixties Unplugged: A Kaleidoscopic History of a Disorderly Decade. The “youthquake” was more of a “hypequake,” he argues.

MEGAN MCARDLE: “I have to say, I don’t like to hear that Barack Obama is going slow on supporting Georgia against Russia’s land-grab. Russia not only attempts to exert economic and military hegemony over its neighbors; it has a distinct dislike for free elections.”