Hitler's moustache. His moustache is the most instantly recognisable - and sinister - in history. Yet, according to new research into Adolf Hitler's early life, the distinctive, toothbrush shape that adorned his scowling face was not his first preference.

What is wisdom?

Eli Lilly And Company Introduces Reconcile(TM) For Separation Anxiety In Dogs.

Work in literature. "Joshua Ferris, author of an acclaimed debut about office life, goes in search of the workaday world in American literature." From the U.K. Guardian. If you're gonna turn off your TV this week, you'll likely be reading more than normal. Might as well read the literature Ferris looks at, like Bartleby the Scrivener (setting: 19th century Wall Street), Kafka's The Metamorphosis, The Great Gatsby, Sinclair Lewis's Babbitt, Richard Yates's Revolutionary Road, and George Saunders's Pastoralia.

Fascist America, in 10 easy steps. By Naomi Wolf. Because it's been too long since we've enjoyed a good old skool "Bush sucks" thread. The intrepid H-Dawg posted this link here, but it seemed FPP-worthy.

Tony Judt on the French presidential election. more inside

Righteous blog post about the sorry state of health insurance in the U.S. "They're in business to take your money then deny your claims."

On Elliott Gould. Born Elliott Goldstein, raised in Bensonhurst (which "was to stand-up comedy as the Mississippi Delta was to country blues"), married to Barbra Streisand (who called him the "American Belmondo"), part of the 60s/70s Hollywood "Jew Wave," Gould made perhaps his most lasting mark in Robert Altman's The Long Goodbye. (No, he didn't die. Does someone have to be dead to be worth talking about?)

Are upcoming U.S. postal rate hikes fair? The new rates, which go into effect on July 15, were developed with no public involvement or congressional oversight, and the increased costs could damage hundreds, even thousands, of smaller publications, forcing many to the brink of bankruptcy. This includes virtually every political journal in the nation. (Shockingly, the new plan was drafted by Time Warner, the largest magazine publisher in the nation. All evidence available, as Robert McChesney explains in an editorial on CommonDreams, suggests the bureaucrats responsible have never considered the implications of their draconian reforms for small and independent publishers.)

U.S. evangelicals aim to influence European law

Mike Tyson goes Bollywood! No, really.

60 years ago, Jackie Robinson broke baseball's color barrier. He was Hank Aaron's hero. What would he have thought about today's game? Why is Garret Anderson of the Anaheim Angels refusing to join others in baseball in honoring Robinson?

Polish witch hunt. "Under the law, which was passed last October and entered into force on 15 March this year, 700,000 Poles are required to confess any collaboration with the communists between 1945 and 1989. All senior civil servants, university professors, lawyers, headmasters and journalists born before 1972 must now confess their past sins by 15 May."

Miami sex offenders living under bridge. "They've often said that some of the laws will force people to live under a bridge," said Charles Onley, a research associate at the federally funded Center for Sex Offender Management. "This is probably the first story that I've seen that confirms that."

The MLK Jr. you don't see on TV. It's become a TV ritual: Every year on April 4, as Americans commemorate Martin Luther King's death, we get perfunctory network news reports about "the slain civil rights leader." The remarkable thing about these reviews of King's life is that several years - his last years - are totally missing, as if flushed down a memory hole.

Left Behind? Not this book series. Before the first installment in Tim LaHaye's and Jerry B. Jenkins' modern-day stories based on the Book of Revelation appeared in 1995, Christian fiction was typically tucked away in Christian bookstores. Now, 43 million books later, the Left Behind titles have paved the way for these books and others like them to be sold in chain outlets, discount stores and big box retailers.

No rulebreaking at Wal-Mart! more inside

The BBC is the future of your newspaper. Maybe.

Which drugs are most harmful? According to this, heroin's worse than cocaine, which is worse than alcohol, which is worse than cannabis, which is worse than LSD. Some results you'd expect, and some surprises. (From The Lancet, free registration required.) more inside

This whole Jim Cramer thing is really, really interesting. more inside