Howard Dean: “Kill The Senate Bill”  —  In a blow to the bill grinding through the Senate, Howard Dean bluntly called for the bill to be killed in a pre-recorded interview set to air later this afternoon, denouncing it as “the collapse of health care reform in the United States Senate,” the reporter who conducted the interview tells me.

Inconvenient truth for Al Gore as his North Pole sums don't add up  —  Hannah Devlin, Ben Webster, Philippe Naughton in Copenhagen  —  There are many kinds of truth.  Al Gore was poleaxed by an inconvenient one yesterday.  —  The former US Vice-President, who became an unlikely figurehead …

Taunton second-grader suspended over drawing of Jesus  —  A Taunton father is outraged after his 8-year-old son was sent home from school and required to undergo a psychological evaluation after drawing a stick-figure picture of Jesus Christ on the cross.  —  The father said he got …

Pranksters Make Short Work of GOP's URL Shortener for Conservatives  —  The Republican National Committee's GOP.am home page was offline Tuesday morning, and several URLs entered into the system by pranksters have been blocked.  —  Revised and expanded at 12:50 ET, with comment from Political Media president Larry Ward.

Source: Dems Threaten Nelson In Pursuit of 60  —  While the Democrats appease Senator Lieberman, they still have to worry about other recalcitrant Democrats including Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson.  Though Lieberman has been out front in the fight against the public option and the Medicare buy-in, Nelson was critical of both.

Trusting Nature as the Climate Referee  —  Imagine there's no Copenhagen.  —  Imagine a planet in which global warming was averted without the periodic need for thousands of people to fly around the world to promise to stop burning fossil fuels.  Imagine no international conferences wrangling over the details of climate policy.

CLIMATE CHANGE IS NATURAL: 100 REASONS WHY  —  HERE are the 100 reasons, released in a dossier issued by the European Foundation, why climate change is natural and not man-made:  —  1) There is “no real scientific proof” that the current warming is caused by the rise of greenhouse gases from man's activity.

Chet Edwards: Not retiring  —  Texas Rep. Chet Edwards will run again in 2010, his office announced today, in response to his name being mentioned as a potential retiree in a story done today by the Fix and Dan Balz.  —  “He is buoyed by the support of Republicans, Democrats and Independents across …

Putting Obama on Hold, in a Hint of Who's Boss  —  President Obama didn't exactly look thrilled as he stared at the Polycom speakerphone in front of him.  “Well, I appreciate you guys calling in,” he began the meeting at the White House with Wall Street's top brass on Monday.

Poll: Obama approval rating positive, but just barely  —  There's a new USA TODAY/Gallup Poll out today and Washington bureau chief Susan Page has the latest on President Obama's numbers:  —  When he was inaugurated in January, Obama scored a job rating of 64% approve-25% disapprove …

The GOP had at most 55 Senators during Bush's presidency  —  I've heard people say that it's not fair to criticize the Democrats for botching health care reform because the Democrats never truly had a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate.  Sure, they have 60 votes in principle …

Eugene Robinson on Sarah Palin's flip-flop on climate change  —  Sarah Palin is such a cold-eyed skeptic about the Copenhagen summit on climate change that it's no surprise she would call on President Obama not to attend.  After all, Obama might join other leaders in acknowledging that warming is a “global challenge.”

Rep. Capuano Tells Fellow Dems: 'You're Screwed'  —  WHAT'S YOUR REACTION?  —  When House Democrats gathered on Friday for their end-of-the week caucus meeting in the basement of the Capitol, caucus chairman John Larson (D-Conn.) told the group he wanted them to hear first from Rep. Michael Capuano …

Herseth Sandlin's Standing  —  The Democratic brand in South Dakota is not very strong right now, and that has Stephanie Herseth Sandlin looking at her toughest fight for reelection since 2004 next year despite the fact that she herself is pretty popular.  —  52% of voters in the state disapprove …

Obama's Christian Realism  —  If you were graduating from Princeton in the first part of the 20th century, you probably heard the university president, John Hibben, deliver one of his commencement addresses.  Hibben's running theme, which was common at that time, was that each person is part angel, part devil.

The Obama administration has picked the worst possible case for its first torture trial.  —  For close to a year now, the Obama administration has been playing judicial Whac-a-Mole over accountability for Bush administration torture policies.  Each time an opportunity arises to assess …