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.

DEMOCRATS ADMIRE THIS RACIST & EUGENICIST:    A newly rediscovered video of Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger is revealing just how racist this pioneering eugenicist and hero of the political left was.  Concludes Arina Grossu in her Washington Times op-ed, “a total of 64 percent of U.S. abortions [are] tragically performed on minority groups. Margaret Sanger would have been proud of the effects of her legacy.”

Hillary Clinton received the Margaret Sanger Award in 2009, declaring enthusiastically,  “I admire Margaret Sanger enormously . . . . I am really in awe of her.”

But of course it’s the Republicans who are waging the War on Women, particularly minority women, at least according to the DCCC.

DO WE NEED AFFIRMATIVE ACTION FOR JOURNALISTS?:  Apparently so.  Only a paltry seven percent of journalists surveyed are Republican.  I’m sure Eric Holder or the EEOC will be appalled by this lack of diversity and initiate disparate impact threats forthwith.  Unfortunately, as much of a discrete and insular minority Republican (or conservative) journalists are, they aren’t a “protected class” under our Constitution or civil rights laws.  Ideological diversity isn’t the “kind” of “diversity” our civil rights laws protect– as Condoleeza Rice and other conservatives on campus have found out.

SO MUCH FOR SAVING $2,500 PER YEAR:  John Merline over at IBD breaks down the high cost of getting Obamacare up and running:

Add it all up, and ObamaCare’s startup cost is at least $6.7 billion. Even if every one of the 8 million enrollees pays their premiums all year, the cost is more than $837 per sign-up.

And if recent surveys are correct that just a third of enrollees previously lacked coverage, ObamaCare will have cost $2,500 for each newly insured person.

Yikes.  And this doesn’t even count the double-digit increases in health insurance policies fueled by Obamacare’s cornucopia of benefit mandates.

THE TEA PARTY, REVISITED:  Sean Trende’s interesting take over at RealClearPolitics.  I tend to agree with his assessment.  Division within the Republican ranks isn’t a new phenomenon (we are a diverse bunch, after all), and tea party candidates have been about as good as establishment candidates, in terms of avoiding gaffes.  Plus tea party candidates have the benefit of being outsiders, not professional politician-wanna-bes, which is always refreshing.

VEGETATIVE STATE MISDIAGNOSES:   . . . are more prevalent than many (even physicians) think.  The case of Canadian Scott Routley is another example.  Diagnosed as in a persistent vegetative state (PVS) for years, new research using functional MRI has demonstrated that Routley is aware of his surroundings and capable of answering simple yes or no questions by being asked to think of certain things for “yes” and other things for “no,” which light up different areas of his brain, visible on the MRI.

I explored this topic extensively in my book, The Law of Life & Death and in a recent TEDx talk.  The research is truly a game-changer for severe brain injury, and proves rather definitively that many PVS patients are actually in a minimally conscious state (MCS) instead.

TORTURE CLAIMS AGAINST THE VATICAN:  David Rivkin & Lee Casey explain why the push in the UN to condemn the Vatican of violating the Convention on Torture is a perverse interpretation of that important treaty.

ANOTHER ONE BITES THE DUST:   Massachusetts is scrapping its Obamacare exchange, following on the heels of Oregon.  I wonder if these decisions have anything to do with the Halbig v. Sebelius case pending in the D.C. Circuit?  If the court in Halbig rules for the plaintiff, neither tax subsidies nor the employer mandate would apply in those States that opt-out of running their own exchanges.  Governors in red states would likely applaud this result, but Governors in blue states like Oregon and Massachusetts would not.  It’s just a thought.

IT’S OFFICIAL:  GOWDY NAMED CHAIR OF BENGHAZI SELECT COMMITTEE:   Boehner has officially named the pitbull (and this is a compliment) as chair of the new Select Committee on Benghazi.

FINALLY, AN AG WHO UNDERSTANDS HIS DUTY:   But unfortunately, it’s not Eric Holder.  Arkansas AG Dustin McDaniel, a Democrat, supports same-sex marriage but has vowed to defend in court Arkansas’s state constitutional amendment limiting marriage to one man, one woman.  I will give kudos to this guy, who–unlike too many of his fellow Democrats these days–puts the law ahead of his own personal preferences, unless/until a court declares the law unconstitutional.

DIVIDED COURT NARROWLY UPHOLDS INVOCATION PRAYER AT TOWN MEETINGS:   Amazing to me how close this was (5-4).  Along strict conservative versus liberal lines.  Don’t the liberals understand that there is no “separation of church and state” clause?  All there is an Establishment Clause in the First Amendment, which says, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion . . . .”  How anyone could think an invocation prayer–delivered by officials representing various religions–could constitute an “establishment of religion” is just a hair shy of cray cray.  Ya think maybe they’re just hostile to religion generally?

EPA GIVES YOUR TAX DOLLARS AWAY AS A “BONUS”:  An Inspector General audit shows that the EPA gave about a half million dollars in unauthorized bonuses to about 11 lucky employees as “retention” awards.  Some employees received the extra pay for years (again, unauthorized), even after being promoted.  But hey, I’m sure this is just an isolated thing.  I’m sure the rest of the federal government runs smoothly and efficiently.

SPEAKER BOEHNER’S “ELECTILE DYSFUNCTION” GETTING WORSE:  Is there a little blue pill for this?  If so, Boehner better start popping some quick.  His tea party-backed primary opponent, J.D. Winteregg, is closing fast in the polls.   I think if Boehner grew a pair, his dysfunction would recede without the need for pharmaceutical intervention.

S.C. SENATE VOTES TO REPEAL COMMON CORE:  Their vote was unanimous.  If approved by the State House, S.C. would develop its own curriculum as an alternative.  What a radical idea:  locally devised and controlled curriculum!

RELATED:  Have you seen the CC math?  It is an exercise in obfuscation— truly inane.  And don’t get me started on the CC lessons on government, which include an outrageous bastardization of the Second Amendment.

CAN CONGRESS SUE THE PRESIDENT FOR NOT FAITHFULLY EXECUTING THE LAWS?:  The question is one of so-called “congressional standing.”  I’ve written a lot about this in recent months and my conclusion/recommendation to the House Judiciary Committee is that the answer is “yes.”  The Wall Street Journal’s editorial this morning concludes the same, and mentions (gratefully) the work of yours truly and David Rivkin.

STATE-LED CALLS FOR CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS:  If you can’t get 2/3 of both houses of Congress to propose a constitutional amendment, you can bypass it and get 2/3 of the State legislatures to call for a constitutional convention.  While none of the 27 constitutional amendments have been enacted via a state-called convention, the possibility is increasingly intriguing to those on both the political left and right.

Liberals and progressives have begun an effort to get States to propose a convention focusing on amending the First Amendment– yep, you heard that right.  Vermont’s uber-liberal legislature on Friday just called for such a convention.  They are furious over the Supreme Court’s decisions to uphold free speech via political spending in Citizens United and McCutcheon v. FEC.  So they want to restrict the First Amendment by somehow trying to insert language that prohibits spending in political campaigns.

Conservatives and tea party supporters are considering calling a state-led constitutional convention to ponder amendments relating to balanced budgets, limiting federal power, and even repealing the Sixteenth Amendment (federal income tax).  There is a large planning meeting for this possibility taking place in Indianapolis this June. 

Hmmm…. let’s consider the themes here:  The liberals/progressives want to amend the Constitution to limit one of our most fundamental freedoms.  The conservatives/tea partiers want to amend the Constitution to limit government power.   But somehow the average American–even prominent Republicans themselves– thinks of the GOP as the “Party of No”?

A MARSUPIAL TIGER WOODS?:   The male of this cute little Australian marsupial apparently goes on an incessant mating spree.  But it isn’t as good as it seems:

Males relentlessly bound from partner to partner, as massive hormone releases in their bodies cause their immune systems to crash and their fur to fall out. They bleed internally. Some males even go blind, yet still stumble around the leaf litter hoping for one last tryst. In a few short weeks, every single male lies dead, leaving the females to raise their offspring.

I guess there can be too much of a good thing?

LIBERAL RACISM:   It’s been fascinating to watch the ultra-liberal MSM work overtime to portray LA Clippers owner Donald Sterling as a Republican, which is necessary to fit with their Republicans-are-per-se-racist (and Democrats are not) narrative.  But as Derek Hunter points out in this Townhall piece, the liberals/progressives are overtly– and unapologetically–racist toward any minority that disagrees with their position.  Witness the recent characterization by U.S. Rep Bennie Thompson (D-MS) of Justice Clarence Thomas as an “Uncle Tom.”  Says Hunter:

Democrats have locked up the black vote for generations not because they’ve solved any problems in the black community – those they’ve attempted to address have done nothing but get worse – but because they’ve cynically, and diabolically injected race into every issue and labeled with “otherness,” anyone who strays from the orthodoxy they’ve deemed “acceptable thought” for black Americans.

The liberal/progressive PC police for African-American thought are ruthless indeed.  So this is Obama-led, post-racial America?

DE BLASIO CONTINUES BLOOMBERG NANNY ASSAULT AGAINST BIG SODAS:  Don’t these progressives have anything better to do than spend our tax dollars fighting sodas they think are “too big”?  Apparently not.  NYC  Mayor De Blasio vows to defend the soda ban on appeal and, if necessary, re-enact it.  (And yes, despite the “R” that appeared after his name on the ballot, Bloomberg was a progressive. They lurk in the political crevices of both parties.).

RELATED:  Will nanny state progressives tax evil “sugar” the way they have tobacco?

FROM SKIN CELLS TO STEM CELLS TO SPERM:  Stanford scientists have successfully converted skin cells cultured from infertile men and created early stage sperm, using stem cell therapy.

The research is at an early stage, but scientists suspect that the converted skin cells might have grown into mature sperm cells if they had been transplanted into the infertile men’s testes.

If further work confirms the suspicion, it may be possible to restore male fertility by taking men’s skin cells, turning them into stem cells, and injecting these into their testes. The same might be done for men who are left infertile after having chemotherapy for cancer.

HILLARY’S 2016 BUMPER STICKER:

YOU SMELL SO GOOD!:  Apparently, the smell of men and women is discernible to mice, and the smell of men induces anxiety, not just in mice, but several other studied species such as guinea pigs, dogs and cats.  Laboratories might be well advised to use more women to conduct certain experiments.

Relatedly, a new study shows that exposure to male and female hormones communicate gender to us, without any overt visual clues.  Apparently, women can smell men, and men can smell women.  “Interestingly, the researchers found that homosexual males responded to gender pheromones more like heterosexual females did. Bisexual or homosexual female responses to the same scents fell somewhere in between those of heterosexual males and females.”

GEORGE WILL “VERY PRO-TEA PARTY”:  The conservative icon talks to Jamie Weinstein of the Daily Caller about the tea party, correctly observing that it is a “huge force” in the GOP.  Yep–exactly.

DUMBING DOWN TORTURE:  A UN Committee Against Torture is considering a claim by liberal groups that the Vatican has violated the UN “torture” convention by– get this– not acting swiftly and resolutely enough to respond to allegations of sexual abuse by priests.  Don’t get me wrong–sexual abuse of children by priests is abhorrent and dioceses should pay dearly for these transgressions. And the Vatican has already been formally criticized by the UN for violating the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which is understandable.

But to say the Vatican has committed “torture” by not responding quickly or vigorously enough waters down the meaning of “torture” to include anything that someone thinks is not a good or sincere enough apology.

LIBERAL STUPIDITY ON RUTGERS CAMPUS:  Condoleeza Rice withdraws from the Rutgers commencement speech after a small minority of idiotic faculty and students protest, calling her a “war criminal.”  This, alone, lowers my opinion of Rutgers and its faculty significantly.  Have they never heard of “tolerance” or “diversity of ideas”?  Apparently not.