Will Obama Save Liberalism?  —  All good things must come to an end.  Jan. 20, 2009, marked the end of a conservative era.  —  Since Ronald Reagan's election in 1980, conservatives of various sorts, and conservatisms of various stripes, have generally been in the ascendancy.  And a good thing, too!

Blago Says He Thought of Oprah for Senate  —  Blago Goes on ‘GMA’ and Skips His Impeachement Trial  —  Illinois' beleaguered Gov. Rod Blagojevich said today that when he was deciding who would take President Obama's Senate seat he considered appointing talk show queen Oprah Winfrey.

BEHIND THE EXECUTIVE ORDERS  —  On Thursday, President Barack Obama consigned to history the worst excesses of the Bush Administration's “war on terror.”  One of the four executive orders Obama signed effectively cancelled seven years of controversial Justice Department legal opinions authorizing methods …

Bad Faith Economics  —  As the debate over President Obama's economic stimulus plan gets under way, one thing is certain: many of the plan's opponents aren't arguing in good faith.  Conservatives really, really don't want to see a second New Deal, and they certainly don't want to see government activism vindicated.

JUST PLANE DESPICABLE  —  ‘RESCUED’ CITI BUYING $50M JET  —  Beleaguered Citigroup is upgrading its mile-high club with a brand-new $50 million corporate jet - only this time, it's the taxpayers who are getting screwed.  —  Even though the bank's stock is as cheap as a gallon of gas …

The Stimulus Time Machine  —  That $355 billion in spending isn't about the economy.  —  The stimulus bill currently steaming through Congress looks like a legislative freight train, but given last week's analysis by the Congressional Budget Office, it is more accurate to think of it as a time machine.

Nationalization Gets a New, Serious Look  —  WASHINGTON — Only five days into the Obama presidency, members of the new administration and Democratic leaders in Congress are already dancing around one of the most politically delicate questions about the financial bailout …

Obama's Initial Approval Ratings in Historical Context  —  Rank among the best for a newly elected president since World War II  — USA - Government and Politics - Leadership - Presidential Job Approval - The Presidency - Americas - Northern America  —  PRINCETON, NJ …

Krugman shows why we need more progressive voices on TV  —  When I was at MoveOn, media reform was one of my main issues.  I had substantial dialogues with the folks at ABC's This Week about the right-wing skew of some of their Sunday roundtables.  —  To his credit, George Stephanopoulous …

For $10, Fuld Sold Florida Mansion to His Wife  —  Housing prices are falling around the country, but this one sounds hard to believe: A seaside mansion on Jupiter Island in Florida, bought for more than $13 million five years ago, was just sold for $10.  —  That's right, 10 bucks.

Feingold Introduces 28th Amendment  —  I hope you'll excuse the hubristic headline.  Constitutional amendments are introduced all the time in the Congress.  Most of them are used to make a political point of one kind or another and stand little chance of becoming law.

Rail in the Stimulus  —  Rep Peter DeFazio has authored an amendment that would increase the level of rail funding in the stimulus bill.  It's an excellent idea.  Funds for highway repairs are a fine use of stimulus money, but insofar as we're investing in new transportation capabilities …

New, Transparent WhiteHouse.gov Forgoes Press Briefing Transcripts?  —  Barack Obama's administration may be promising the “greatest ethical standard ever administered to an executive branch,” and increased transparency over his predecessor, but it seems to be forgoing at least one transparency practice …

Senate Seat Is Latest Stop On Bennet's Unlikely Ride  —  Learning on the Job Has Become Coloradan's Hallmark  —  Michael Bennet has been sleeping in his mother's Woodley Park house and taking the Metro to a borrowed conference room in the Hart Senate Office Building to meet with staff members, who are also on loan.

Ready-for-Disaster Republicans  —  Beneath the warm pledges of bipartisanship and the earnest calls for cooperation in the midst of a grave crisis lurks an unpleasant fact: From the moment it loses power, the opposition party turns to the task of getting it back.  —  Party politics has not been suspended.

Major U.S. Companies to Slash 43,000 Jobs  —  American companies announced job cuts totaling 43,000 this morning, as the global downturn slammed the profits of such exporters as Caterpillar and a domestic recession hit hard at retailer Home Depot.  —  As companies begin announcing …

Bill Ayers denies '70s plot to blow up Detroit police sites  —  Bill Ayers, leader of a 1960s radical anti-war organization who helped launch Barack Obama's political career in Chicago in the 1990s then threatened to derail it when their relationship became an issue in the 2008 campaign, will be in Michigan Monday.

Franken Has the Lead, but Coleman Has His Day in Court  —  The longest-running Senate campaign in the nation heads into the home stretch this week.  We think.  —  Today in St. Paul, Minn., a three-judge panel will kick off a trial featuring Norm Coleman, the incumbent Republican senator who …

Top EU official: Hamas fully responsible for Gaza war  —  Hamas bears full responsibility for the war in Gaza, a top EU official said Monday in the Strip, calling the group “a terrorist movement.”  —  “At this time we have to also recall the overwhelming responsibility of Hamas,” Louis Michel …