The PLI said 67 of its 90 titles are now available in the Kindle format. "Our average book is easily over 1,000 pages, and a number are multivolume sets, so you're talking about a lot of information," said William Cubberley, who oversees the PLI's publishing program. "You'll be able to carry an entire law library on your Kindle."

The push for conversion to plug-in electric cars will do nothing to stop carbon emissions, a report by the GAO warns, throwing cold water on a push by Democrats to get more plug-ins on the road. In fact, the problem could be made worse as demand goes up at coal-fired electrical plants. Plus, the need for batteries may just have the US changing the dictators to which we’re chained, as IBD reports: ...

The Republicans were essentially threatened and terrorized against voting for revenue. Now [some] are facing recalls. They operate under a terrorist threat: “You vote for revenue and your career is over.” I don’t know why we allow that kind of terrorism to exist. I guess it’s about free speech, but it’s extremely unfair.

Godwin's Law (also known as Godwin's Rule of Nazi Analogies)[1] is a humorous observation coined by Mike Godwin in 1990, and which has become an Internet adage. It states: "As a Usenet discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1."
...
There are many corollaries to Godwin's law, some considered more canonical (by being adopted by Godwin himself)[2] than others invented later.[1] For example, there is a tradition in many newsgroups and other Internet discussion forums that once such a comparison is made, the thread is finished and whoever mentioned the Nazis has automatically "lost" whatever debate was in progress. ...

Inspectors general at five financial regulatory agencies are objecting to legislation that would elevate their positions to the presidential-appointment level, arguing that the move would compromise their ability to conduct independent investigations.

The bill would elevate the five officials at the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the National Credit Union Administration, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp.

Supporters of the measure say the five IGs need greater flexibility and more distance between their work and possible interference from agency leadership, especially amid the economic meltdown.

Here it goes again: The state has unbounded natural wealth. It has the nation’s largest population. Its economy is the most diversified. California should be awash in cash, given that both its income and sales taxes are also the highest in the United States. Instead its deficit is also the largest in the nation.

Economists, of course, have explained why the state is broken — and their exegeses are truly multifaceted, a perfect storm of sorts: State government is far too large. Employees enjoy pensions and compensation far above that found in private enterprise. Spending exceeds the rate of growth and inflation. Plentiful oil is not drilled; rich farmland is taken out of production; available timber is not always logged; nuclear power is shunned; key roads are delayed; natural wealth is considered nature’s, not man’s; yet men are not to live natural lives.

Here's a dilemma: You manage a public employee pension plan and your actuary tells you it is significantly underfunded. You don't want to raise contributions. Cutting benefits is out of the question. To be honest, you'd really rather not even admit there's a problem, lest taxpayers get upset.

What to do? For the administrators of two Montana pension plans, the answer is obvious: Get a new actuary. Or at least that's the essence of the managers' recent solicitations for actuarial services, which warn that actuaries who favor reporting the full market value of pension liabilities probably shouldn't bother applying.

Public employee pension plans are plagued by overgenerous benefits, chronic underfunding, and now trillion dollar stock-market losses. Based on their preferred accounting methods -- which discount future liabilities based on high but uncertain returns projected for investments -- these plans are underfunded nationally by around $310 billion.

The wife of the new head of MI6 has caused a major security breach and left his family exposed after publishing photographs and personal details on Facebook.

Sir John Sawers is due to take over as chief of the Secret Intelligence Service in November, putting him in charge of all of Britain’s spying operations abroad.

But entries by his wife Shelley on the social networking site have exposed potentially compromising details about where they live and work, their friends’ identities and where they spend their holidays. On the day her husband was appointed she congratulated him on the site using his codename “C”.

Honduras' ousted President Manuel Zelaya said he was getting on a flight home to reclaim his post on Sunday, accompanied by the U.N. General Assembly president and a group of journalists.

The interim government said it ordered the military to prevent the landing of Zelaya's plane. If turned away, it will likely land in El Salvador, where a separate flight was headed with Latin American leaders who support Zelaya's reinstatement.

He (the President) shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur;...

The head of Mossad, Israel’s overseas intelligence service, has assured Benjamin Netanyahu, its prime minister, that Saudi Arabia would turn a blind eye to Israeli jets flying over the kingdom during any future raid on Iran’s nuclear sites.

Earlier this year Meir Dagan, Mossad’s director since 2002, held secret talks with Saudi officials to discuss the possibility.

The Israeli press has already carried unconfirmed reports that high-ranking officials, including Ehud Olmert, the former prime minister, held meetings with Saudi colleagues. The reports were denied by Saudi officials.

“The Saudis have tacitly agreed to the Israeli air force flying through their airspace on a mission which is supposed to be in the common interests of both Israel and Saudi Arabia,” a diplomatic source said last week.

Although the countries have no formal diplomatic relations, an Israeli defence source confirmed that Mossad maintained “working relations” with the Saudis.

After the (revolutionary) war, there were calls for (General George) Washington to claim formal political power. Indeed, seven months after the victory at Yorktown, one of his officers suggested what many thought only reasonable in the context of the 18th century: that America should establish a monarchy and that Washington should become king. A shocked Washington immediately rejected the offer out of hand as both inappropriate and dishonorable, and demanded the topic never be raised again.

At the moment, many Filipinos are worried that the current President, Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, will amend the constitution in order to extend her term. It may not ring a bell in Washington, but the parallels are obvious in Manila. Bautista writes:

The parallels between the Philippines and Honduras are uncanny. As we all know very well [Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's] GMA’s allies in Congress have been assiduously pushing for charter change … Zelaya’s ouster was precipitated by his insistence on having a constitutional convention … Both moves are seen as attempts to extend the president’s term of office. GMA’s allies want to proceed with a con-ass [constitutional assembly] even without the Senate (clearly unconstitutional), while Zelaya wants a referendum on the convening of a con-con [constitutional convention] without congressional authorization as required by Honduras’s constitution. …

Mr. Bautista’s piece might remind Washington that Third World Countries striving to become countries of “laws and not men” also have to struggle with problem of preserving their institutions even as they are tempted to take shortcuts to solve ’social justice’ problems. The idea that Zelaya ought to be supported by Washington because he is considered by some NGOs to be a “man of the people” may or may not have moral validity. But even if he were, restoring him in violation of Honduran laws also has a downside. Those who worked for years to restore the semblance of constitutional rule in a Third World after a dictator has torn them up know how that it is much easier to scramble an egg than to unscramble it. Once the laws of Honduras are circumvented with a wink and a nod the temptation to circumvent them again will be irresistible. Honduras and the Honduran constitution may not mean much beyond a narrow circle in Washington, but to the Hondurans, it is all they have.

There are probably a great many ambitious leaders in the Third World who are watching how Washington handles the Honduran crisis. It is all the more reason to act carefully and wisely.