GOP plots Senate health roadblock  —  Democrats might like to think that health care reform is all but a done deal if it clears the House, but the Senate is where Republicans have been plotting for months to sentence it to a painful procedural death.  —  Republican aides have been mining …

Stupak: Health fight has been ‘living hell’  —  Leading a revolt against President Barack Obama's healthcare legislation over abortion has been a “living hell” for Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.).  —  The telephone lines in his Washington and district offices have been “jammed” …

Rules Panel Dem To Vote Against Bill  —  A key House Dem has begun informing party leaders he plans to vote against health care legislation both on the House floor and in the rules committee, on which he sits.  —  Rep. Michael Arcuri (D-NY), a sophomore Dem who had a tougher …

Breaking: Choi Arrested at White House Gates  —  UPDATE: Both Lt. Dan Choi and Jim Pietrangelo have been arrested after they handcuffed themselves to the White House gates on Thursday afternoon to protest “don't ask, don't tell.”  —  Story developing...  In what appears to be an unscripted act …

I-Team: DOJ Serves Subpoenas in Senator Ensign Investigation  —  LAS VEGAS — Nevada Senator John Ensign is in the crosshairs of a Department of Justice criminal investigation.  —  The criminal probe stems from a romantic affair Ensign had with the wife of his key staffer and close friend …

Has Rahm's assumption about progressives been vindicated?  —  Politico's Ben Smith yesterday suggested that one important aspect of Rahm Emanuel's health care strategy — to ignore the demands of progressives on the ground that they would fall into line at the end no matter what — has been vindicated.

Planned Switch to G.O.P. Stirs New York Governor Race  —  ALBANY — A governor's race that seemed all but settled is about to be upended again, by a popular Democrat from Long Island who is set to announce that he is switching parties.  The move is certain to excite Republican leaders pessimistic about their party's hopes this fall.

Canceling the trip  —  The cancellation of President Obama's trip to Asia marks the full reversal of the strategy his presidency began with: Flooding the zone with policy, keeping the President out of the weeds.  —  The decision to cancel his trip may look like a sign of urgency but it's also …

GOP Doc Asks Pelosi: ‘Are you so arrogant ... ignorant ... incompetent?’  —  ABC's Z. Byron Wolf reports: Democrats might have themselves a health reform bill, but Republicans have doctors - way more doctors in Congress, anyway, than Democrats.  And they're steamed.

Don't Be Morose!  Get Even!  —  David Brooks says he's out on the ledge, morose, and about to have a “Howard Beale” moment.  Just last week he was telling us that Obama was a misunderstood moderate.  Now he confesses that Obama is aiding and abetting unlawfulness of the worst kind.  He explains:

Conrad Predicts Senate Changes to Reconciliation Bill  —  Senate Budget Chairman Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) said Thursday that it is unlikely the Senate will be able to pass a health care reconciliation bill unchanged from what the House passes.  —  Conrad said the Senate Parliamentarian has declined …

He Took My Lunch Money, Or, Why Women Need Full Health Care  —  Once more, with feeling ...  I'm not the only woman in the country who once had a partner who took my paychecks and deposited them in an account that I had no access to; not by debit card, not by checkbook.

Texts Without Context  —  In his deliberately provocative — and deeply nihilistic — new book, “Reality Hunger,” the onetime novelist David Shields asserts that fiction “has never seemed less central to the culture's sense of itself.”  He says he's “bored by out-and-out fabrication …

Health care overhaul to get fresh look from Rep. Anh ‘Joseph’ Cao, at request of President Barack Obama  —  President Barack Obama on Wednesday asked Rep. Anh “Joseph” Cao, R-New Orleans, to take a fresh look at the language on abortion in the Senate health care bill to see whether he could …

Rep. Steve King and Glenn Beck agree: Voting for health reform on Sunday is ‘an affront to God.’  —  With this morning's release of the Congressional Budget Office's reconciliation package score, the House appears ready to vote on health care reform this Sunday.

“Libertarians,” Sprawl, and Land Use  —  Randal O'Toole has a baffling and bafflingly long post dedicated to trying to rebut my very simple view of the relationship between “sprawl” and land-use regulations.  So I'll just restate my argument in briefer form and ask O'Toole to say what, if anything, in it he disagrees with:

Bret Baier — By: Seth Leibsohn  —  Bret Baier just concluded the single best interview of President Obama in a year, by any reporter.  He was resilient in the face of the president's obvious attempts to run down the clock by stonewalling; Bret continually hammered a series of questions …

PUZZLING STATEMENT: OBAMA SAYS ‘LOUISIANA PURCHASE’ WILL HELP WITH THE EARTHQUAKE IN HAWAII  —  Gateway Pundit: What earthquake in Hawaii?  In 1868 there was a major earthquake in Hawaii that killed 77 people.  In 1975 an earthquake in Hawaii killed 2 people.

Access, Access, Access  —  First, a question: When in American history did life expectancy improve the most?  —  Was it the late 1800s, when anesthesia made surgery easier and far more common?  Was it the 1930s, when antibacterial medicines became available?  Or recent decades, when CAT scans and heart bypasses proliferated?