Empathy Triumphs Over Excellence  —  President Obama's nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor shows that empathy has won out over excellence in the White House.  Sotomayor has sterling credentials: Princeton, Yale Law School, former prosecutor, and federal trial and appellate judge.

Bush vs. Gore rivals challenge Prop. 8 in federal court  —  Two prominent attorneys who argued on opposite sides of Bush vs. Gore, the legal battle over the 2000 presidential election, announced Tuesday that they will challenge Proposition 8 in federal court and seek to restore gay marriage until the case is decided.

Burris on tape offering a check for Blagojevich  —  A transcript of a secretly recorded phone call between the brother of former Gov. Rod Blagojevich and U.S. Sen. Roland Burris was released in federal court today, a call in which Burris, then seeking the Senate seat, was recorded offering the Blagojevich campaign a campaign check.

North Korea Threatens Armed Strike, End to Armistice  —  North Korea threatened military action in response to South Korea joining a program to seize weapons shipments, and said it's no longer bound by the 1953 armistice that ended the Korean War.  —  South Korea's actions are tantamount to a …

Montana town wants Gitmo detainees  —  HARDIN, Montana (CNN) — The tiny town of Hardin, Montana, is offering an answer to a very thorny question: Where should the nation put terror detainees if the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, is shut down by the end of the year as President Obama has pledged?

Court overrules Michigan v. Jackson  —  Splitting 5-4, the Supreme Court on Tuesday overruled its 23-year-old ruling in Michigan v. Jackson on the rights of a criminal suspect in police custody who has asked for a lawyer.  The Court did so in Montejo v. Louisiana (07-1529), in an opinion written by Justice Antonin Scalia.

Millionaires Go Missing  —  Maryland's fleeced taxpayers fight back.  —  Printer  —  Friendly  —  Here's a two-minute drill in soak-the-rich economics:  —  Maryland couldn't balance its budget last year, so the state tried to close the shortfall by fleecing the wealthy.

Canada official eats seal heart  —  Canada's governor general, Michaelle Jean, has helped to butcher and eat a seal in an apparent act of solidarity with hunters.  —  Ms Jean used a traditional Inuit knife to help gut the animal then ate a slice of raw heart.

AT&T May Have Swayed ‘Idol’ Results  —  LOS ANGELES — AT&T, one of the biggest corporate sponsors of “American Idol,” might have influenced the outcome of this year's competition by providing phones for free text-messaging services and lessons in casting blocks of votes at parties organized …

Exploding debt threatens America  —  Standard and Poor's decision to downgrade its outlook for British sovereign debt from “stable” to “negative” should be a wake-up call for the US Congress and administration.  Let us hope they wake up.  —  Under President Barack Obama's budget plan, the federal debt is exploding.