An Unnecessary War  —  I know from personal involvement that the devastating invasion of Gaza by Israel could easily have been avoided.  —  After visiting Sderot last April and seeing the serious psychological damage caused by the rockets that had fallen in that area, my wife, Rosalynn …

Obama Digs In for His BlackBerry  —  WASHINGTON — President-elect Barack Obama has yet to relent, but he conceded that he might be losing the battle to keep his independent lifeline to the outside world.  —  “I'm still clinging to my BlackBerry,” Mr. Obama said Wednesday.  “They're going to pry it out of my hands.”

MO-Senate: Bond to Retire  —  Missouri Sen. Kit Bond (R) will retire in 2010, a decision that hands Democrats a prime pickup opportunity in a state where the party has made strides in recent years.  —  “In 1972, I became Missouri's youngest Governor,” Bond said this morning in an address to the Missouri General Assembly.

Barack Obama asks longtime University of Chicago professor Cass Sunstein to join his administration  —  Law scholar will handle regulation issues, transition official says  —  WASHINGTON — Cass Sunstein, a longtime University of Chicago legal scholar and prominent author …

BART Cop Needs to Be Held without Bail  —  I have yet to see any widespread nationwide coverage on the New Year's execution style murder of Oscar Grant by a Bay Area Rapid Transit - BART - police officer.  Somebody told me that they saw 5 minutes of coverage on CNN last night.

Obama Presses for Action on Economy  —  WASHINGTON — President-elect Barack Obama on Thursday urged Congress to act quickly to pass sweeping economic stimulus measures, including a tax cut and an infusion of as much as $800 billion, or face the likelihood that “this recession could linger for years.”

Obama, Spider-Man on the same comic-book page  —  In a growing world of Barack Obama collectibles, one item soon may be swinging above the rest.  —  On Jan. 14, Marvel Comics is releasing a special issue of Amazing Spider-Man #583 with Obama depicted on the cover.

A SOLUTION TO A PROBLEM THAT DOESN'T EXIST.... You've got to be kidding. … These guys aren't pushing a bill to get rid of the Fairness Doctrine, because it's already gone.  They're pushing a bill to prevent anyone from trying to bring it back — despite the fact that there is no meaningful effort to do so.

Pelosi: No February recess without stimulus  —  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Thursday said she will keep Congress in session through the Presidents Day recess if an economic stimulus package isn't completed for President-elect Obama by then.  —  Pelosi's comments came just minutes …

Updated Senate Phone List Erases Norm Coleman  —  The Democratic Senate leadership is doing everything it can to pretend that Norm Coleman doesn't exist.  It shut down his Capitol Hill office earlier this week, and a Senate source provides Mother Jones with a copy of an updated phone list …

Daschle Pledges a Bipartisan Reform of Health Care System  —  WASHINGTON — Former Senator Tom Daschle pledged on Thursday to work with lawmakers of both parties in a grass roots, ideology-free campaign to revamp the nation's struggling health care system.  —  “We will be guided by evidence …

Obama's ‘first mistakes’ mount  —  Team Obama has made its first mistake — again.  —  When Gov. Bill Richardson withdrew his nomination as commerce secretary earlier this week, NBC's Andrea Mitchell declared it “the Obama team's first misstep.”  —  But Mitchell had been scooped.

Why Obama Will ‘Own’ the Recession  —  For eight decades, Democrats have successfully blamed Republican Herbert Hoover for the decade-long Great Depression.  That, even though Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal failed to restore prosperity or dramatically lower unemployment, and his tax increases in 1937 snuffed out a nascent recovery.

ANY REAL CONSTITUENCY FOR BOLD ACTION?  —  Here's my question.  —  In the avalanche of writing about a massive Stimulus Bill, the one proposition (though grandly general) that's been of most interest to me is one that is heavy on infrastructure spending and spending on R&D geared toward developing a sustainable Green economy.

President Bush Tried to Rein In Fan and Fred  —  Democrats and the media have the housing story wrong.  —  Mythmaking is in full swing as the Bush administration prepares to leave town.  Among the more prominent is the assertion that the housing meltdown resulted from unbridled capitalism under a president opposed to all regulation.