There's a movement afoot to prosecute Eric Holder for perjury in connection with his testimony to Congress over when he first heard about the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives' Operation Fast and Furious. Given that the testimony at issue included the words, "I'm not sure," and "probably," this movement strikes me as extremely far-fetched.

I admit I've had a soft spot for Mr. Holder dating back to the mid-1990s, when I was living in Washington, D.C. and Mr. Holder was U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia. I saw him speak to a small Jewish community group and came away favorably impressed. My respect for him only increased when, as a partner at Covington and Burling, Mr. Holder became involved with Philip Howard's tort reform organization Common Good.

The Washington Examiner's Timothy Carney has an item pointing out that Apple never started a political action committee, and that its Washington lobbying spending was small relative to other technology companies. He writes: "It takes the courage that your own ideas can thrive in a market, without protective regulation or handouts."

Steve Jobs's life is an inspiring college-dropout, son-of-immigrant success story of America and capitalism, as highlighted here earlier. But it's also a reminder to cultural conservatives that the 1960s and 1970s weren't 100% bad.

Jobs, according to this Fortune article, has called his LSD experiences "one of the two or three most important things I have done in my life." Apple ads featured a long-haired, cross-legged John Lennon and the slogan "think different."

From a Bloomberg News dispatch:

The benchmark index for U.S. stocks will climb 14 percent from yesterday to end 2011 at 1,300, according to the average estimate of 12 strategists surveyed by Bloomberg. The last time they were this bullish in October was 2008, when the group predicted a 27 percent gain and the index lost 18 percent.

Imagine that. This group of soothsayers was off by 45 percentage points just three years ago, yet Bloomberg is still churning out stories about what they predict, and institutions are still employing them. I hope these "strategists" are right, but I don't believe them any more than I believed the "experts" who said the Red Sox were going to win the World Series this year.

More to come on Steve Jobs, but for now here is the item we did back in August when he resigned as Apple's CEO.

Pass the Cement Regulatory Relief Act, preventing the Environmental Protection Agency from imposing new rules on cement manufacturers that the industry says would kill 4,000 cement jobs and another 12,000 to 19,000 construction jobs. More information on the act is here.

Earlier:

Cost-Free Job-Creating Idea No. 16: Roll back state licensing requirements for occupations like auctioneers, ballroom dance teachers, yoga instructors, interior designers, and florists.

Cost-Free Job-Creating Idea No. 15: Give all 50 states waivers from ObamaCare's requirements and let them experiment with their own plans to increase coverage, improve health care quality, and reduce costs.

Democrats wondering how to win elections could do worse than to check out the campaign of Earl Ray Tomblin, who yesterday was elected governor of West Virginia. His campaign Web site says "More Jobs, Lower Taxes," and his record and proposals for tax cuts were an important part of his campaign. He was endorsed by the National Rifle Association, and reacted by saying, "My support for gun owners and gun owners' rights has never wavered, and I will continue to fight for Second Amendment issues as governor of our great state." On energy, he supported coal ("There are some who want to turn their backs on coal - not me") and natural gas fracking: "The continued expansion of natural gas exploration in West Virginia can fuel a whole new energy economy, and I will go anywhere and do anything to create these jobs right here at home." As acting governor, he reportedly pursued a lawsuit against the Obama administration's Environmental Protection Agency to fight its regulations on coal.

The Wall Street Journal has details of how President Obama's "jobs" bill would affect airlines and passengers:

The proposal includes a doubling of the federal security surcharge of $2.50 per one-way trip to $5. Annual increases would triple the fee to $7.50 by 2017....Gary Kelly, CEO of Southwest Airlines, estimates the proposed [$100 per] departure tax alone would cost his company $140 million a year. ...US Airways Group Inc. estimates the departure tax could cost it $110 million a year. AMR Corp.'s American Airlines pegs its expense at $124 million.

Rush Limbaugh:

Now, we have a Politico story today. "Dick Durbin Urges Customers to Leave Bank of America." I want you to stop and think about this for a second.
This is the Senate majority whip, and he went to the floor of the United States Senate yesterday and made a speech urging citizens who are customers of Bank of America to leave the bank. Now, is this the role of United States senators? Is this the role of anybody in government, to stand up in their official capacity and to tell you where you should and should not conduct business? Of course it's not! Who the hell does he think he is? This is not the proper role of government, to tell you what bank to use...

Here is the video of Senator Durbin:

This one comes from the Institute for Justice, a non-profit libertarian law firm, via the Wall Street Journal editorial page: roll back state licensing requirements for occupations like auctioneers, ballroom dance teachers, yoga instructors, interior designers, and florists:

By imposing onerous and usually pointless requirements on those wishing to enter a trade or line of work, state legislatures erect needless barriers around occupations perfectly suited for those entering the work force, midcareer switchers, and pink-slip recipients. Only one in 20 workers needed the government's permission to pursue their chosen occupation in the 1950s, notes University of Minnesota Prof. Morris Kleiner. Today that figure is nearly one in three.

Earlier:

Boston Red Sox player Kevin Youkilis airs a complaint about the lack of accountability by the press:

when they're not accurate on those stories, one, that's not fair to the person that they're writing about, but two, it's not fair to the public. It's not fair to the fans [to get] inaccurate stories. They don't need to be fed inaccurate stories and the problem is we have no accountability anymore. Things just get blasted on Twitter. Things get blasted out everywhere, and next thing you know, the story's out there, the athlete can't answer the question because, you know what, either way, you're better off not answering...

In Boston, Mayor Menino is opposing a proposed Walmart, the Boston Globe reports:

A spokeswoman for Mayor Thomas M. Menino said a Walmart would undercut local businesses, including the nearby Tropical Foods market, whose owners are planning to expand in the neighborhood.

City officials also said they want a mix of retail uses at the 8.5-acre site, such as restaurants, a day-care center, and smaller locally owned shops.

"Dudley Square is a unique and special place in the heart of the city, and we don't believe Walmart is in keeping with that uniqueness," said the mayor's spokeswoman, Dot Joyce.

If the votes aren't there for Idea No. 1, repeal ObamaCare, then the next best thing would be to give all 50 states waivers from the law's requirements and let them experiment with their own plans to increase coverage, improve health care quality, and reduce costs. That way at least the states with more free-market-oriented governors or legislators can free their states of the law's job-killing aspects. Governor Romney talks about this idea in the presidential debates.

Earlier:

Cost-Free Job-Creating Idea No. 14: End state and local blue laws that keep retailers closed, or restrict sales of certain items, on Sundays.

Cost-Free Job-Creating Idea No. 13: Eliminate requirements for legal ads in print newspapers in connection with business formation.

That is the headline over my latest weekly column, which is up at Reason.com. Check it out here.

USA Today has a news article with a look at where the Super Committee's debate on Medicare cuts is headed:

Under the health care overhaul passed last year, the 2.9% Medicare tax was raised for individuals with income above $200,000 and couples above $250,000. Now the focus is on upper-income Medicare beneficiaries with income above $85,000, who already pay more for outpatient care and prescription drugs.

"I guess you go after rich people," says Robert Laszewski, a non-partisan health care consultant. "That's where you've got the most ability to hurt someone who can take the hurt."

Obama has proposed raising premiums for upper-income beneficiaries and gradually bringing more people into that group, so that eventually one in four seniors would pay more.

First it was "millionaires and billionaires," now it's anyone making more than $85,000 a year and on Medicare. Sometimes that slippery slope really is slippery.