White House Reporter Protects Cheney, Accuses Gibbs Of Taking “Swipe”  —  One of the odder things we've seen from some members of the White House press corps this year is a kind of zealous over-protectiveness of the previous administration — Dick Cheney, in particular.

The 10 punches Dick Cheney landed on Barack Obama's jaw  —  The spectacle of two duelling speeches with a mile of each other in downtown Washington was extraordinary.  I was at the Cheney event and watched Obama's address on a big screen beside the empty lectern that the former veep stepped behind barely …

Sobbing Kindergarteners Snubbed for Steelers?  —  Kids locked out of White House; officials say they were too late  —  Thursday was supposed to be the highlight of the year for more than 100 kindergarteners from Stafford County, Va. They got up early and took a chartered bus to the White House for a school field trip.

McAuliffe, LU Democrats hold call on club ban  —  Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe held a conference call with reporters this morning.  —  Liberty University's Democratic party club president Brian Diaz and the club's staff adviser, Maria Childress, answered questions …

Steele: Obama ‘Was Not Vetted Because The Press Fell In Love With The Black Man Running For The Office’  —  Apparently unable to learn from egregious mistakes from the recent past, RNC Chairman Michael Steele once again took to the radio airwaves today as a guest host for Bill Bennett.

Bush: It's ‘liberating’ to be out of office  —  He gets warm welcome from group of graduating N.M. high school students  —  ARTESIA, N.M. - It was a humbling moment for the former commander in chief: President George W. Bush was walking former first dog Barney in his new Dallas neighborhood …

President Above-It-All  —  EDITOR'S NOTE: This column is available exclusively through King Features Syndicate.  For permission to reprint or excerpt this copyrighted material, please contact: kfsreprint@hearstsc.com, or phone 800-708-7311, ext 246.  —  Put Barack Obama in front of a teleprompter …

Media Fawns Over Newt, Ignores Other Former Congressional Leaders  —  Steve Benen observes that these days Newt Gingrich is everywhere you look: … It's a really strange situation.  If were an editor looking for an op-ed from a conservative point of view about the California budget crisis …

“I don't know why your husband doesn't put a gun to his temple.”  —  En route to pick up a tux for a wedding I'm attending this weekend, I flipped on the radio in my mother's car, found it tuned to the AM dial, and heard a host so petulant that he is an outlier even on talk radio.

U.S. to Steer GM Toward Bankruptcy  —  Filing Expected as Chrysler Set to Emerge  —  The Obama administration is preparing to send General Motors into bankruptcy as early as the end of next week under a plan that would give the automaker tens of billions of dollars more in public financing …

Labs Contest  —  Apps for America 2: The Data.gov Challenge  —  What it Is  —  Apps for America is a special contest we're putting on this year to celebrate the release of Data.gov!  We're doing it alongside Google, O'Reilly Media, and TechWeb and the winners will be announced …

Blue Double Cross  —  That didn't take long.  Less than two weeks have passed since much of the medical-industrial complex made a big show of working with President Obama on health care reform — and the double-crossing is already well under way.  Indeed, it's now clear that even as they met …

Facts and myths about Obama's preventive detention proposal  —  [Updated below - Update II (Interview with ACLU) - Update III - Update IV ]  —  In the wake of Obama's speech yesterday, there are vast numbers of new converts who now support indefinite “preventive detention.”

Citizen Spies Lift North Korea's Veil  —  With Sleuthing and Satellite Images, Mr. Melvin Fills the Blanks on a Secretive Nation's Map  —  SEOUL — In the propaganda blitz that followed North Korea's missile launch last month, the country's state media released photos of leader Kim Jong Il visiting …

Yossi Melman / Obama quashed Israel military option against Iran  —  Israel's military option against Iran has died.  The death warrant was issued courtesy of the new U.S. administration led by Barack Obama.  —  All the administration's senior officials, from the president to his vice president …

Some GOP-ers step away from Cheney  —  Dick Cheney's full-throated attack on the Obama administration has left congressional Republicans with a tricky decision: Do they embrace his critiques, even if it means aligning themselves with the most polarizing figure from the still-unpopular Bush administration?

NEWS FROM THE PLAIN DEALER  —  Headlines for Cleveland and Northeast Ohio  —  Waves of immigrants now calling Philadelphia home; new Welcoming Center idea behind the lure  —  Vacant homes.  Empty storefronts.  Ghostly streets.  —  In a scenario hauntingly familiar to Cleveland …

Rush: Love tangle for Citigroup exec  —  It's no secret that Citigroup board Chairman Richard Parsons has been working for months to repair the financial giant.  —  But, until now, even his closest associates didn't know he also was wrestling with a personal crisis - how to tell his wife …