How about that? It turns out the Bush administration’s proposed “stimulus package” includes yet another reduction in the capital gains tax.

Between that and the elimination of “double taxation” on corporate dividend payments, I’ll bet millions of working- and middle-class families are going nuts this week.

Here’s another surprise: The Washington (Moonie) Times published an article by someone named Bruce Bartlett -- “Breaking the Mold With Blogs” -- praising the emergence and growing influence of weblogs, and awarded huzzahs to right-wingers Andrew Sullivan -- whose blog, not coincidentally, is rehashed in the Times each Friday -- and Mickey Kaus.

But what about the great Professor InstaLinker?

Zzzzzzzzzz.

Joan Didion, the world’s second-best long-sentence writer (after me, of course), has a new essay in the latest issue of the New York Review of Books, this -- “Fixed Opinions, or The Hinge of History” -- based on a lecture given last November at the New York Public Library -- about terrorism, New York, the death of irony, the Pledge of Allegiance, NATO, Iraq, those dying off old white liberal guys from the 1960s, and, of course, California, written during a period of reflection after, actually long after, but within reminiscence of, a two-week-long book-promotion tour, and extending, albeit in Didion’s signature gripping, nay, fascinating, manner, for all of 11 pages.

I thought my 1997.5 Infiniti J30 -- in black, naturally -- had a great engine for its time and size, but now I learn General Motors is said to be developing a 1,000-horsepower, V-16 engine for the Cadillac line. Incredible.

After remarking upon this, a sibling informed me that my grandfather once owned a 1932 Marmon, a vehicle of great beauty built in the early 1930s with one of automotive history’s most celebrated V-16 engines.

You can view photos of the Marmon 16 -- of which only 500 were manufactured -- here and here.

Is there a newspaper in America with a web site that launches more pop-up windows than the Los Angeles Times? If so, I haven’t found it.