OH SCANDAL this youngling Brian Deese, a 14-year-old hired by the president to reform the auto industry — the American auto industry, that is — does not even drive an American car. Instead he drives a two-door Honda Civic hatchback with a shitty paint job, referred to informally as the “Pussy Wagon.” On this day before the most patriotic day of the year, it is fair to ask the question: does Deese understand how completely insane Japanese people are? [The Sleuth]

Ha ha ha we randomly clicked on this LA Times headline thinking, “Alex Kozinski, isn’t she that rich NYT gal with the plastic surgery and the surrogates?” But no, duh, the name should ring a bell because Alex Kozinski is the infamous cow porn judge who shocked America last June with revelations that he kept pubic-hair shaving instructionals and other naughty photos, such as naked ladies painted like cows, on some (whoops!) publicly accessible Web page. MORE »

• Profound economy-related insight: continued widespread unemployment is bad because “people without jobs tend not to spend much money.” [Washington Post]
• Iran plans to try some local British embassy staff for fomenting unrest. Thank goodness the US doesn’t have any embassies in Iran! [New York Times]
• The thug who replaced the other thug in Honduras said he’d be willing to hold elections soon, so as to appear less thuggish. [Los Angeles Times]
• Senators are hard at work trying to figure out how to make future health care reform most closely resemble our current situation, so as to “control costs.” [Wall Street Journal]
• A rare copy of the Declaration of Independence turned up in the British National Archives, answering definitively the question of whether the British had ever “gotten the memo.” [AP]
• Sorry your bazillion-dollar new iPhone 3GS turns into a slab of molten lava when you try to use Wi-Fi during phone calls! CNET]

HOBO KEN LAYNE TO WANDER BEACHES AND WRITE BOOK ABOUT CALIFORNIA: If the publishing industry isn’t officially dead yet, this is sure to kill it! At some point in 2010, HarperStudio will publish “a history of California’s culture, environment and politics framed by [Layne's] bravely idiotic solo hike up the entire 1,000-mile coastline of America’s weirdest, most populous state.” It will sell like hotcakes, as long as he publishes under the moniker “Meg McCabe.” [New York Observer, HarperStudio]

Throughout the history of American journalism, reporters have upheld one vital standard: asking the tough questions and holding to account the most powerful person in the nation, which is to say, the First Lady. But is our national legacy of unbiased investigative East Wing reporting suddenly in peril because some black gals are writing about Michelle Obama? MORE »

Somehow it seems unlikely that this dude, who vows not to read Wonkette ever again, has read much of it in the past. MORE »

Yesterday while the rest of you were out shopping for booze or maybe just emptying out the still in anticipation of today’s 12th annual National Unemployment Day, President Obama was hard at work hanging out with a bunch of pilots — some pretty awesome lady pilots from World War II, and also the first female Thunderbird pilot. Sometimes his job does not seem so bad. [The President's Very Effective Propaganda Photo Site]

THE SAD ROMANTICAL BALLAD OF MARK SANFORD: “Of course, when you’re a middle-aged man facing the collapse of your life’s work and abandoning hope of being with the woman you call your ‘ soul mate’ rational decision making or a clearly considered plan may be too much to expect.” Illustration by our pal Lauri. [TPM]

In these difficult times, when it seems everything is declining — corporate profits, individual incomes, assorted varieties and levels of a thing we used to call “hope” — one thing grows ever larger and more robust: our unemployment rate. Let’s hear it for the magical number 9.5, for that is the percentage of Americans who currently don’t have jobs. MORE »

• Now that we don’t have to worry about Iraq anymore, we can start worrying about Afghanistan instead, where a “major operation” was just launched. [CNN]
• Soon California won’t be able to pay its bills and it will start issuing IOUs scratched out on bits of scrap paper as “currency.” [AP]
• Several of Michele Bachmann’s fellow Republicans have urged her to fill out her census form completely, so that the administrators of ACORN-run internment camps can track her down without wasting taxpayer dollars on a private investigator. [Washington Post]
• What is the point of living, really, if you can’t have Vicodin? [ABC News]
• The auctioning of Iraqi oil-development rights that went so well the process attracted one whole bidder was indeed a success because it showed the Iraqis weren’t going to whore themselves out to foreign oil companies. And that stunning success is why they’re going to move up bidding on a bunch of undeveloped or partially developed fields from late this year to “within the next few months.” [Wall Street Journal]
• After days of caterwauling to the press about his forbidden love affair, crybaby blabbermouth Mark Sanford fell suddenly silent as people asked fewer questions about his girlfriend and more about when he was going to resign. [AP]

Mark Sanford was all set to publish a book about “fiscal conservatism” or some other boring topic, but then he poked that South American lady and now he is a Tainted Whore of Babylon with no credibility, fiscal policy-wise. Will the publisher still put out his dull economics text or what? Will they scrap the whole thing and force him to write a SALACIOUS TELL-ALL MEMOIR instead? We hope so! [Political Ticker]