Suddenly, North Carolina Is Facing Tighter Race  —  RALEIGH, N.C. — Just days before the North Carolina primary, the Democratic presidential contest in this state is suddenly alive with a fresh air of competition, as Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton seeks to capitalize on a controversy …

A Blacklash?  —  Since January, the Clintons have pummeled Barack Obama with racially tinged comments and questions about his character.  —  Hillary Clinton has questioned why he didn't walk out on the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr.; why he “denounced” but didn't “reject” Louis Farrakhan …

Is this man John McCain's worst nightmare?  —  Bob Barr, former GOP congressman from Georgia, is an all-but-announced presidential candidate - as a Libertarian.  —  The possibility of a run by Barr has sent shudders through the mainstream of the Republican party.

Fred Hiatt on the noble glories of occupation  —  (updated below)  —  Long-time war cheerleader Fred Hiatt of The Washignton Post has a truly incoherent Editorial this morning in which he cites the problems he says are created by air strikes of the type the U.S. just carried …

Colorful Tory Beats Laborite to Become Mayor of London  —  LONDON — Boris Johnson, the floppy-haired media celebrity and Conservative member of Parliament who transformed himself from a shambling, amusing-aphorism-uttering figure of fun into a plausible political force, was elected mayor of London on Friday.

McCain stumbles while attempting to explain his Iraq oil remarks.  —  At a townhall event yesterday, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) implied that the U.S. went to war in Iraq over oil, saying that if America had energy independence that would “prevent us from having ever to send our young men and women into conflict again in the Middle East.

Paul: Not ready to endorse McCain, likes Obama's foreign policy  —  (CNN) — Even though Rep. Ron Paul has never officially ended his long shot presidential bid, he's ready to weigh in on the three remaining major candidates for the White House.  —  In an interview on The Situation Room …

Wright Postmortem  —  Why the Obama Pass?  —  I think we have sort of reached an impasse on Rev. Wright.  Most Americans, I think, accept the following realties.  Obama, by what he wrote in his memoirs, by what he said when he spoke in his early campaign speeches, by his frequent praise of Wright …

Iraqis begin to “despise” the Mahdi Army in Baghdad's Rusafa district  —  2nd Lieutenant Mike Hebert leads White Platoon of the Blackfoot Troop, 3-89 Cavalry on a presence patrol of a difficult neighborhood in southern Rusafa District, Baghdad.  Photo by Bill Ardolino.

“My immigrant vagina is angry” and other militant May Day moments  —  The MSM focused on the diminished numbers of May Day protesters earlier this week, but those who did turn out were as militant as ever.  Blog correspondents from across the country sent in their coverage.

Arianna Huffington's Right is Wrong  —  Arianna Huffington's latest book — Right Is Wrong: How the Lunatic Fringe Hijacked America, Shredded the Constitution, and Made Us All Less Safe — thoroughly documents the most influential fact in our political life: namely, that the right-wing faction …