It's Not An Option  —  Congress: It didn't take long to run into an “uh-oh” moment when reading the House's “health care for all Americans” bill.  Right there on Page 16 is a provision making individual private medical insurance illegal.  —  IBD Exclusive Series: Government-Run Healthcare: A Prescription For Failure

CBO Sees No Net Federal Cost Savings in Dem Health Plans  —  ABC News' Z. Byron Wolf reports:  —  Here's a blow to President Obama and Democrats pressing health care reform.  —  One of the main arguments made by the President and others for investing in health reform now is that it will save …

Why We Endorsed Warrantless Wiretaps  —  The inspectors general report ignores history and plays politics with the law.  —  Printer  —  Friendly  —  It was instantly clear after Sept. 11, 2001, that our security agencies knew little about al Qaeda's inner workings …

Video: Witness rips Boxer for racial condescension  —  Red meat by the slab, folks!  Barbara Boxer wound up getting reamed by Harry Alford, the chair of the National Black Chamber of Commerce, after attempting to challenge his testimony on energy policy.  When Boxer started waving position papers …

Romney Edges Palin, Huckabee in Early 2012 GOP Test  —  Palin's favorable rating stable after announcement of her resignation  —  PRINCETON, NJ — About one in four Republicans and Republican-leaning independents make Mitt Romney their top choice for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination …

DEM HEALTH RX A POI$ON PILL IN NY  —  TERRIFYING 57% TAX LOOMS FOR BIGGEST EARNERS  —  Congressional plans to fund a massive health-care overhaul could have a job-killing effect on New York, creating a tax rate of nearly 60 percent for the state's top earners and possibly pressuring small-business owners to shed workers.

CIA Assassin Program Was Nearing New Phase  —  Panetta Pulled Plug After Training Was Proposed  —  CIA officials were proposing to activate a plan to train anti-terrorist assassination teams overseas when agency managers brought the secret program to the attention of CIA Director Leon Panetta last month …

Up Next: Biden vs. Cantor  —  Vice President Biden plans a political broadside this afternoon in the home district of Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.), accusing the senior Republican lawmaker of joining in his party's smear of the $787 billion Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

40 Years After Apollo 11 Moon Landing, It's Time for a Mission to Mars  —  On the spring morning in 1927 when Charles Lindbergh set off alone across the Atlantic Ocean, only a handful of explorer-adventurers were capable of even attempting the feat.  Many had tried before Lindbergh's successful flight …

Iran Simmers, America Moves On  —  Hillary says it's time to engage Mahmoud.  —  Printer  —  Friendly  —  That didn't take long.  President Obama last week gave Mahmoud Ahmadinejad an autumn deadline to negotiate over Iran's nuclear program.  “We remain ready to engage with Iran …

AIG: Where's the outrage?  —  After American International Group paid out $165 million in bonuses to top executives in March, Congress exploded in a political orgy of outrage.  —  “How do they justify this outrage to the taxpayers who are keeping the company afloat?” asked President Barack Obama.

Obama losing his cool?  —  It's been a tough week for President Obama's cool factor.  —  Not only is he weathering criticism of his policies, but the Cool One has also taken a few dings to his immaculate image in recent days.  —  It started on Monday.  Speaking at the White House …

Sotomayor hearings: Word count — Senators out-talk her 2 to 1  —  Yada yada yada.  According to some politics blog — we'll call it Top of the Ticket — that's been publishing the entire transcript of the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on Sonia Sotomayor's Supreme Court nomination …

How should you talk to your cab driver about cap-and-trade?  16  — TWITTER - NEWSVINE - GOOGLE BOOKMARKS - STUMBLEUPON  —  During my travels to the Rothbury Music Festival, I ended up in a cab in Grand Rapids, Mich., with a very cranky driver who wanted to talk ... about cap-and-trade …

US Unemployment Benefits in International Context  —  Gary Burtless has an interesting paper reviewing the social safety net measures in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.  If you read the paper you'll see that even though these elements of ARRA have gotten less discussion …

Hillary Clinton almost out of the red  —  WASHINGTON (CNN) — Hillary Clinton is almost debt free from her failed bid for the presidency.  —  According to reports filed Wednesday with the Federal Election Commission, Clinton's 2007-2008 campaign for the White House is now only $1.5 million in the red.

BREAKING: AMA Endorses House Bill.  —  Via Health Care for America Now: The American Medical Association just sent a letter to House Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel, endorsing the health reform proposal put forward by three House committees.  —  This is unexpected.  Or, at least, I wasn't expecting it.

CIA Supervisor Claimed He Used Fire Ants On Detainee  —  A recently released legal memo describing interrogation techniques showed that Bush Administration lawyers had approved the use of “insects” in interrogations.  “You would like to place [Abu] Zubaydeh in a cramped confinement box with an insect …