Fred Thompson running for president  —  Fred Dalton Thompson is planning to enter the presidential race over the Fourth of July holiday, announcing that week that he has already raised several million dollars and is being backed by insiders from the past three Republican administrations, Thompson advisers told The Politico.

GOP plots blue-slip attack  —  House conservatives are ready to stop the Senate immigration bill in its tracks with a potent procedural weapon should the contentious measure win passage in the upper chamber.  —  The trump card conservatives may hold is a constitutional rule that revenue-related bills must originate in the House.

Right-wing noise machine: Plame not covert  —  (updated below - updated again - Update III)  —  NBC News, yesterday: … The right-wing noise machine spent the last two years repeatedly, continuously and emphatically telling their followers the exact opposite:

Al-Sadr militia suspected of kidnapping Britons  —  Iraq's most prominent Shia militia has emerged as the chief suspect in the kidnappings of five British nationals in Iraq.  —  Negotiations with the Mahdi Army are already under way after one of several spokesmen for the armed force under …

Economix: Truth, Fiction and Lou Dobbs  —  The whole controversy involving Lou Dobbs and leprosy started with a "60 Minutes" segment a few weeks ago.  —  The segment was a profile of Mr. Dobbs, and while doing background research for it, a "60 Minutes" producer came across a 2005 news report …

Libertarians, beware the rigid reign of Rudy  —  Behind Rudy Giuliani's impressive lead in the polls is one fact that puzzles the pundits: Many cultural conservatives are backing a pro-choice, pro-gun control candidate.  But what should be equally surprising is the strong support Giuliani …

Lieberman in Iraq sees "progress," says so-called surge "would start to break the insurgency"  —  What a coincidence.  Two years after Cheney said the insurgency was in its last throes, Joe Lieberman made essentially the same prediction.  —  CNN reports that Lieberman is on an unannounced "surprise" visit to Baghdad.

Justices' Ruling Limits Suits on Pay Disparity  —  The Supreme Court on Tuesday made it harder for many workers to sue their employers for discrimination in pay, insisting in a 5-to-4 decision on a tight time frame to file such cases.  The dissenters said the ruling ignored workplace realities.

Some Hitherto Staunch G.O.P. Voters Souring on Iraq  —  Through four elections, Debbie Thompson has supported Representative Mark Steven Kirk, a Republican and staunch backer of the Bush administration's policies in Iraq.  —  But Ms. Thompson, a mother of two from this affluent suburb of Chicago …

CHAVENEZUELA  —  How the Man Who Would Be Castro marked a new milestone on the path towards totalitarianism by shutting down the nation's most popular television station.  He will keep at it until there is no free press left and no one to report the fact that it disappeared.

The persecution of Lina Joy, continued  —  No, you cannot convert: Three cheers for sharia!  —  Last August, I wrote about the plight of an ex-Muslim woman in Malaysia named Lina Joy.  She had converted to Christianity and wanted to marry a Christian man.