Over at Reason, Nick Gillespie has a mostly insightful and important rumination on the very American people who descended on Washington, D.C. for Glenn Beck's Restoring Honor Rally. His take on the role of religion, however, is a little off. Okay, maybe a lot off.

Gillespie notes that Beck "is channeling a very strong tradition in American with regards to religion and the public square." He describes the objective of that tradition as "'embracing' God and putting him back in the center of our lives, both private and public." But Gillespie thinks that any "anxiety" about "turning God [...] out of the public square" is misplaced, because "politicians are far more publicly pious than they used to be." He admits "that may be less important than the feeling" -- but can't identify any rational source for that feeling. This is a mistake.

But the truth is hiding in plain sight, between the lines of Gillespie's otherwise clear-eyed synopsis. ...

Cosmologist Steven Hawking and physicist Leonard Mlodinow publish an excerpt from their upcoming atheist apologetic “The Grand Design” in today’s Wall Street Journal.

Ignorance of nature's ways led people in ancient times to postulate many myths in an effort to make sense of their world. But eventually, people turned to philosophy, that is, to the use of reason—with a good dose of intuition—to decipher their universe. Today we use reason, mathematics and experimental test—in other words, modern science.

So, using “reason, mathematics and experimental test” we get all the benefits of modern life, including proof that the order we see around us arose spontaneously due to random chance. A problem with this argument, highlighted in recent years by sophisticated computer simulations, is that our universe seems custom-tuned for our existence, making chance evolution highly improbable. The slightest variation of one of many fundamental physical laws would make impossible, in Douglas Adams’ words, “life, the universe and everything." But there’s no need to consider agnosticism. Our intrepid cosmologists ride to the rescue:

That is not the answer of modern science. ...

I walked past the news agent at the airport in San Francisco last night and nearly dropped my coffee on the ground when I saw the cover of Time. Blue background, Star of David fashioned out of daisies on the cover, and the headline, in the center: "Why Israel Doesn't Care About Peace." No sub-headline.

The article itself is by Karl Vick, whom I know vaguely--he was in my introductory Turkish class about five years ago--and it's actually well-written and well-observed. He makes some good points. Judith would agree with some of them, I think. But I dare say few people are going to buy the magazine and read the article or think through the points he's making or, particularly, read through to the last paragraphs, which reveal that his slant is ironic and that of course Israelis are desperate for peace--every last one of them has a kid who is either in the army or going to be soon!--but despairing of the prospect and doing the best they can to get on with things anyway, because that's the only way they can get through their days without going mad. ...

At the Washington Examiner, Mark Tapscott reports that "one of President Obama's earliest policy moves on the energy and environment front has been shut down by a federal judge."

U.S. District Judge Dee Benson ruled Thursday that Ken Salazar, Obama's Secretary of the Interior, exceeded his lawful authority in March 2009 when he suspended 77 oil and gas leases on western federal lands that had been awarded to high bidders. [...] "'the secretary exceeded his statutory authority by withdrawing leases after determining which parcels were to be leased and after holding a competitive lease during which the BLM named the plaintiffs high responsible bidders," said Benson' [...].

This case is more important as a political precedent than as a legal one, for it indicates that at least one judge has decided to enforce the letter of the law in case that involves oil and gas leases on federal lands. The issue here is of massive importance because the United States owns huge chunks of western lands over which it has well-nigh complete discretion to lease, or not to lease (to paraphrase Hamlet) these lands. ...

Mark Steyn returns. Need we say more? Ok, we will: we cover GZM, Bridget Bardot, Obama's speech, expectations for this fall, The Dambusters, Michele Rhee, the Beck rally, and we try to get to the bottom of where Mark's been the past few months. You'll just have to listen to hear the answer.

Get your hot links here:

• The NYT GZM Poll is here
• The Dambusters on IMDB. View the trailer and the AMEX commercial (H/T Ed Driscoll).
• Shelby Steele's Ricochet post on The State of Black America
• Michelle Rhee's Wikipedia entry
• Emily Esfahani Smith's Ricochet post on the Glenn Beck rally
• Claire Berlinski's post on Ricochet and the ensuing debate on banning the burqa

Music from this week's episode:

• Wake Up by Arcade Fire
• The Best Is Yet To Come by Frank Sinatra

Direct link to this week's show or better yet, subscribe and have the show delivered automagically each week.

If necessity is mother of invention, then adversity is the wellspring of salty language. So while negotiating through a thick fog of government and labor union ineptitude today, I lit my way through the darkness with fiery descriptions.

One of the government's responses to the 9/11 attacks was to beef up security at our ports. I’m not sure what ordeal ships must endure at port, but for the landlocked, it is a nightmare. My delivery today was to the Georgia Ports Authority, in Savannah, GA. Knowing that the port is a big place, and not having any directions on where exactly in that big place I was to go, I called the number provided.

Port Lady: “Georgia Ports Authority.”

Me: Yes Ma’am, I have a delivery to your location this afternoon, and need directions please. I’ll be traveling north from Jacksonville….

Port Lady: “Do you have a Twick?”

Me: Do I have a what?

Port Lady: Do you have a Twick?

Me: What’s a twick? I have Special Dark candy bars in the truck, if you…

Port Lady: A Twick card. You must have a Twick card to get in the port. ...

The candidate was outraged - just outraged - at the country's sorry fiscal state. "We have managed to acquire $13 trillion of debt on our balance sheet," he fumed to a roomful of voters. "In my view, we have nothing to show for it." And that was a Democrat, Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado, who voted "yes" on the stimulus, the health-care overhaul, increased education funding and other costly bills Congress approved under his party's control. Faced with a potential wipeout in November's midterm elections, candidates such as Bennet are embracing budget cuts with the enthusiasm of Reagan Republicans.

Paul Hodes, the Democratic Senate candidate in New Hampshire, recently proposed $3 billion in spending cuts that would slice airport, railroad and housing funds. Elected to the House four years ago as an anti-war progressive, Hodes lamented that "for too long, both parties have willfully spent with no regard for our nation's debt."

The new push for austerity could prove too little, too late for Democrats, who fear losing their majorities in both chambers of Congress. ...

In this case, the California Constitution. Over at the WSJ's Law Blog, Ashby Jones reports that the Pacific Justice Institute has failed in its attempt to force Schwarzenegger and Attorney General Jerry Brown to defend Prop 8.

Think about it: the voters of a state have lawfully amended their Constitution, and the executive branch responsible for upholding the State Constitution refuses to defend the voters' choice. Aren't they duty-bound to defend Prop 8, provided it is at least arguably consistent with the federal Constitution? Surely Prop 8 meets that minimum threshold, Judge Walker's activist ruling notwithstanding.

Should the executive branch (state or federal) treat the Constitution like a cafeteria plan -- picking and choosing the bits that they want to defend? Isn't that a dangerous precedent?

Like a lot of Americans, I’m spending more and more time on job-search sites. I’m really, really hoping I don’t have to go back to work, but it’s sort of looking that I’ll have to. We’ve already cut down our grocery list to the barest essentials (no more US Magazine or wine), and I’m giving up my beloved 2% Greek yogurt for 0% Greek yogurt because, for some reason, only the 0% kind is sold at Costco. My husband is dropping his cell phone line. We’re probably going to get rid of our cable TV.

Even with these cuts, I still may have to return to work. So, I’ve been hitting JournalismJobs.com a couple of times a day. The chances of finding a part-time job, near our house Connecticut, which has me only working the evening and weekend hours when my husband is home, and which suits my unique (limited) skills are probably slim.

But lookee here! This morning, I see something I’m perfectly qualified for. It’s for a people person who is interested in promoting sports. That’s got “me” all over it. Wait, what’s this? ...

Our extra-special star Guest Contributor Harry Shearer had to wish us a fond adieu a bit ahead of schedule, but that won't stop us from looking back on his wit and wisdom, as we are wont to do, today -- the day before our next Guest Contributor makes his debut.

So reckon once again with the strange spectacle of the 5th anniversary coverage of Katrina... revisit the uncanny way the media tells itself -- and you -- what it wants to hear... and thrill to the speech of a President just in from planet Zarg.

All told, a very fine show indeed, Mr. Shearer. Thanks a million for dropping in. Here's a cheer for your docu, and a tip of the hat to you!

Here at Ricochet, we’ve been paying close attention to the race in Michigan’s 15th congressional district, where Dr. Rob Steele is waging a brave campaign against Democratic Congressman John Dingell. Dingell has served in the House since 1955. John Dingell has been causing trouble in Washington, in other words, for four years longer than Fidel Castro has been causing trouble in Havana.

The Steele campaign just conducted a new poll. The results? Remarkably good.

• Although Dingell leads by nine points, Steele wins among Independents

• Among voters who have heard of Dr. Steele--still only 39 percent of the district--Dr. Steele leads by ten points

• When voters learn that Dr. Steele is a first-time candidate whose top priority will be to stop the out-of-control spending in Washington, he moves into a five point overall lead

You don’t have be Karl Rove or James Carville to see what this means. To win, Dr. Steele needs to do only one thing: get his message out.

To help, click here.

Politico reports on the latest Dem tactic to throw off a heavy whiff of desperation:

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s attorneys sent Simon & Schuster a letter Thursday, hinting that the publisher may have violated several campaign finance laws that prohibit in-kind contributions by corporations by posting on its website a promotional video for a book penned by three top House Republicans.

At issue: the publishing house’s promotion of “Young Guns: A New Generation of Conservative Leaders” by Reps. Eric Cantor of Virginia, Kevin McCarthy of California and Paul Ryan of Wisconsin. The DCCC’s attorneys at Perkins Coie sent the New York-based publisher a letter saying it’s improper for a corporation to host a video on its website that directs viewers to a website that solicits contributions for Republican candidates for Congress.

First the independents spurned him. Then the babies. Now, in a truly stunning development, Obama is losing the under-30 demographic:

The college vote is up for grabs this year — to an extent that would have seemed unlikely two years ago, when a generation of young people seemed to swoon over Barack Obama. Though many students are liberals on social issues, the economic reality of a weak job market has taken a toll on their loyalties: far fewer 18- to 29-year-olds now identify themselves as Democrats compared with 2008.

It's almost as if libertarians and conservatives still stand on a vast swath of common ground. What an irony that it would take a generation of college students to remind us of this fact, and that it would be Barack Obama himself who would awaken them to it. The long night of the Obama Zombies might come to an end at last.

Bloomberg columnist Caroline Baum laments that monetarists have “followed Milton Friedman to the grave.”  Monetarist, of course, is a term used to identify those who agree with the ideas of the great free-market economist who died in 2006.  But I see neither those ideas nor their adherents going to the grave.  Indeed, the experience of the economic crisis is proving that Milton Friedman’s ideas were right all along, and they are gaining favor. 

Two of Friedman’s most famous ideas in the macroeconomic sphere were (1) that monetary policy should follow a simple policy rule and (2) that discretionary fiscal policy is not useful for combating recessions, and indeed could make things worse.  Both ideas have been reinforced by the facts during the recent crisis.  

The first idea is reinforced by the evidence that the crisis was brought on by the failure of the Fed to follow the rules-based monetary policy that had worked well for 20 years before the crisis.  Instead, it deviated from such a policy by keeping interest rates too low for too long from 2002 to 2005. ...

With apologies to the advertising agency responsible for creating Dos Equis Beer’s "The Most Interesting Man in the World," say hello to "The Most Insufferable Man in the World," who happens to bear a striking resemblance to a certain Chief Executive.

• When someone within earshot says, "Thank God," he says, "You’re welcome."
• He takes Joe Biden seriously.
• He looks at Mt. Rushmore as a work in progress.
• He reads the Constitution every day...looking for loopholes.
• He appears on The View because he thinks the hosts are hot.
• At Presidential news conferences, he found Helen Thomas’s questions to be coherent.
• He reads Frank Rich columns with a straight face.
• He thinks he looks really cool on a bicycle.
• When it was determined that Jeremiah Wright would be too controversial a choice for Attorney General, he was willing to settle for Eric Holder.
• He thinks Keith Olbermann is witty.

Feel free to weigh in.

What a great time we had last night at the Rico-Suave Super-Exclusive Get-Together! How about those screaming fans and the gate-crashers who failed the "Name Claire's Cats" test and had to be escorted off the premises by the bouncers? Wild, huh?

Anyway, I really enjoyed meeting you all last night but woke up with this odd feeling that something was missing. Then I realized what it was: We opened up all these interesting threads, conversationally, but now they're just hanging out there, even though I've had a night to sleep on them and I still have more to say.

So I'm going to open them up again here, all in one go. Those of you who participated in the conversations can just take it up where we left off. Maybe you'd help me out by filling in the details and explaining where we were when we said goodbye.

Those of you who weren't there--here's what you missed. It's not too late to join the conversation.

1) Spiral Dynamics: What does the theory say, and how can it help us understand the foreign policy outlook of the Obama Administration?

2) Silicon Valley: Whoa, that's cool! You're really building that? ...

"Summer's almost gone," Jim Morrison sings on my laptop. "When summer's gone, where will be be?" Tell us, Mr. President!

Asked to what degree he regrets his administration's decision to call this Recovery Summer, the president stammered then said, “I don't regret the notion that we are moving forward, but because of the steps that we've taken. And I'm going to have a press conference next week, where, after you guys are able to hear where we're at, we'll be able to answer some specific questions.”

He emphasized: “the key point I'm making right now is that the economy is moving in a positive direction, jobs are being created; they're just not being created as fast as they need to, given the big hole that we experienced…We're moving in the right direction. We just have to speed it up.”

Given the big hole that we experienced? The size of unemployment isn't the rate of re-employment. We're not moving quickly enough in the right direction because -- well, the President would tell you, but he's too busy stammering. So I'll tell you. ...

In China, demand for official publications is booming. In fact, one public restroom had to post the following notice:

Which, translated, means: Use of propaganda as toilet paper is strictly forbidden. ...

At Pajamas Media, Myra Adams has a prediction to make:

With 2012 less than 500 days away and just a few months left before the November midterm elections, there is no better time to predict the 2012 Republican presidential ticket, because no one else in their right mind would dare.

Yes, I am aware that predictions of this nature are usually worthless, but they are fun nevertheless, and who doesn’t need some fun in these last depressing days of President Obama’s Orwellian-sounding “Recovery Summer”?

(Which leads one to ask: Does “Recovery Fall” start in September? Or did Recovery Fall eclipse Recovery Summer way back in June?)

These are questions for another time. But as for the 2012 GOP ticket, my prediction as of now is: Governor Haley Barbour and Governor Mitch Daniels.

This would be a historic governor-governor ticket.

In fact, back in March of this year, I co-wrote a Daily Beast column with Mark McKinnon about the strong possibility that the 2012 GOP presidential and vice presidential nominees would come from the statehouse. Now it’s time to stick my neck out and predict these two governors will be the eventual headliners. ...

It's been a couple of weeks since news came out that 18% of Americans think Obama is Muslim. Even more shocking, to me, was that 43% didn't have a clue what his religion was. Just over a third identified Obama as Christian.

Ann Coulter jokingly suggested Obama was an atheist in her recent column. The last line of her piece made me laugh out loud:

There's only one true Christian liberal in the country and that's Mike Huckabee.

David Kopel defends Obama's Christianity over at the Volokh Conspiracy. Big thinker Roger Ebert, meanwhile, says that if George W. Bush, George H.W. Bush, John McCain, Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul, Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh don't sign a statement vouching for President Obama's confession of faith, they will have committed -- and I'm serious here -- "a crime against America."

I had no idea Roger Ebert felt so strongly against Islam.