How public-sector unions broke California. Steven Malanga, City Journal.

Skilcraft pens. Ylan Qui Mui, WashPo. A public option for ballpoint pens. (They sound all right.)

Polarized parties play parliament. Bill Schneider, National Journal.

American politics is becoming more parliamentary. British politics is becoming more presidential. Oddly, though, the countries are moving further apart, not closer. In the United States, the major parties are shifting toward greater polarization. In Britain, where an election has been called for May 6, all signs point toward a more centrist government.

Nick Clegg to win the general election? Has the country gone mad? Boris Johnson, Daily Telegraph.

[The Lib Dems] are a bunch of euro-loving road-hump fetishists who are attempting like some defective vacuum cleaner to suck and blow at the same time; and the worst of it is that if you do vote Lib Dem in the demented belief that there could ever be such a thing as a Lib Dem government, you won't get Prime Minister Clegg. You'll get Prime Minister Gordon Brown, for five more holepunch-hurling years...