Gore campaign team assembles in secret  —  Friends of Al Gore have secretly started assembling a campaign team in preparation for the former American vice-president to make a fresh bid for the White House.  —  Two members of Mr Gore's staff from his unsuccessful attempt in 2000 …

Newt Gingrich blames "Liberalism" for VA Tech massacre  —  Leave it to Newt to spread some love to the left this morning.  It's all the evil—liberals that caused this horrific tragedy.  I guess I could say that Newt influenced Timothy McVeigh...  Download (2175) |  Play (2710) Download (954) |

Laurie David and Sheryl Crow: Karl Rove Gets Thrown Under the Stop Global Warming Bus  —  Last night Thelma and Louise drove the bus off the cliff or at least into the White House Correspondents Dinner.  The "highlight" of the evening had to be when we were introduced to Karl Rove.

It's Sarko vs Sego  —  Nicolas Sarkozy will line up against Ségolène Royal in the French presidential run-off in two weeks' time, according to early exit polls.  —  The unofficial polls were circulated in Paris but cannot be published in France until polling stations close at 8pm.

Haircuts Redux  —  EKlein and GFR think John Edwards is to blame for the Modo Hair Story Fiasco.  I join with Scott Lemieux in placing the onus purely on Dowd and her peers in the media: … One should note that there's a trap here designed to make it impossible, in practice …

Kristol: Reid's Iraq Remark Is 'Much More Disgraceful Than Anything Trent Lott Said'  —  This morning on Fox News Sunday, Weekly Standard editor William Kristol said that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's (D-NV) remark that the Iraq war is lost is "much more disgraceful" than Sen. Trent Lott's …

After Iraqi Troops Do Dirty Work, 3 Detainees Talk  —  Out here in what the soldiers call Baghdad's wild west, sometimes the choices are all bad.  —  In one of the new joint American-Iraqi security stations in the capital this month, in the volatile Ghazaliya neighborhood …

American psycho  —  When Cho killed 32 people at Virginia Tech, the horrific slaughter revealed not only the poisons lurking in popular culture but the crisis of young males in a feminised society, says Sarah Baxter  —  Just before 5am on Monday, April 16, Cho Seung-hui got out of bed and walked to his computer.

Teflon Pete  —  Representative Pete Sessions was very adamant about passing the bankruptcy reform bill and he told everyone in the house the reasons why: … Stirring words, I'm sure you'll agree.  But apparently these calls to protect business from fraud are meant for losers and Democrats, not good Republican friends of Pete's:

Some People Love Guns.  Why Should the Rest of Us Be Targets?  —  Knives also cut bread and carve wood and aid surgery, but guns only shoot bullets.  That's what they are designed to do, and that's what they do.  When we talk about protecting our right to have guns, we are talking about protecting our right to shoot bullets.

82-Year-Old Ex-Beauty Queen Stops Intruder by Shooting Out Tires  —  WAYNESBURG, Ky. — Miss America 1944 has a talent that likely has never appeared on a beauty pageant stage: She fired a handgun to shoot out a vehicle's tires and stop an intruder.  —  Venus Ramey, 82, confronted a man …

Short Takes: Sign a petition to keep our chocolate real  —  The federal Food and Drug Administration is proposing to redefine the very essence of chocolate and to allow big manufacturers such as Hershey to sell a bar devoid of a key ingredient — cocoa butter.