Obama to Open Offshore Areas to Oil Drilling for First Time  —  WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is proposing to open vast expanses of water along the Atlantic coastline, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the north coast of Alaska to oil and natural gas drilling, much of it for the first time, officials said Tuesday.

Countdown Tops CNN Again, But Rates Better Without Olbermann  —  MSNBC continues its dominance of CNN during prime time as the 2nd place cable news outlet, while CNN remains ahead during dayside hours (with Fox News dominating in 1st place in both categories).

Big announcement coming from Hutchison  —  U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison has called a press conference for 10 a.m. Wednesday in San Antonio and is expected to announce whether she will stay in the Senate for the rest of her term.  —  Sen. John Cornyn, her fellow Texas Republican …

Growing ‘Frustration’ With Steele Inside RNC  —  Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele “allowed a certain climate to exist” that resulted in the committee paying for a now infamous visit to a Los Angeles strip club, a senior RNC committeeman tells Fox News.

One Man's Quest to Catalog Presidential Minutiae  —  Radio Reporter Keeps Tabs on Vacations, Dinners, Phrases; a 60,000-Word Summit  —  WASHINGTON—When President Barack Obama told a gathering of the nation's governors last month that he was “not going to rest” until each state's economy improves, Mark Knoller was counting.

New Obama push meets Hill resistance  —  The president's push to turn health care reform into a catalyst for the rest of his agenda is getting mixed early reactions on Capitol Hill, where Democratic leaders' desire to take advantage of healthy majorities before the November elections must contend with lawmakers' survival instincts.

Charles Johnson “Fairly Sure” the Tennesee State Flag is a Neo-Nazi Logo...  And I'm fairly sure the Husky Ponytailed Blogger's a washed-up has-been...  The link he provides goes to this picture:  —  Umm yeah, that's the Tennesee state flag...  FAIL.

Lady Gaga Versus Mideast Peace  —  Are settlements more offensive than pop stars?  —  Pop quiz—What does more to galvanize radical anti-American sentiment in the Muslim world: (a) Israeli settlements on the West Bank; or (b) a Lady Gaga music video?  —  If your answer is (b) …

Barack The Good  —  The big government liberalism that Mr. Obama uses to make himself history-making also alienates him in the center-right America of today.  —  It has to be acknowledged that, in his battle for health-care reform, President Obama has shown real presidential mettle.

Evan Coyne Maloney remembers  —  Evan Coyne Maloney is the documentary filmmaker and proprietor of Brain Terminal.  During the Bush administration, Evan was out in the field with his camera observing protests and interviewing protesters.  He is therefore in a good position to recall the signs …

Militia Probe Included Undercover FBI Agent  —  An undercover agent was part of the federal investigation of a Michigan-based Christian militia group that allegedly planned to spark an uprising against the government by killing police officers, court documents show.

Jaime Escalante dies at 79; math teacher who challenged East L.A. students to ‘Stand and Deliver’  —  He became America's most famous teacher after a 1988 movie portrayed his success at mentoring working-class pupils at Garfield High to pass a rigorous national calculus exam.  He died of cancer.

EXCLUSIVE: Iran Nuclear Scientist Defects to U.S. In CIA ‘Intelligence Coup’  —  Shahram Amiri Disappeared Last June in Saudi Arabia, Reportedly Now Resettled in the United States  —  An award-winning Iranian nuclear scientist, who disappeared last year under mysterious circumstances …

Leftism, the Religion  —  Many Americans find it difficult to understand why Jews on the left, including many who would call themselves “liberal” rather than “left,"continued to enthusiastically support President Obama after the revelations about the anti-Israel and anti-Jewish views …

Democrats On Top In Ohio Senate, Governor Races, Quinnipiac University Poll Finds; Obama Bounces Back From Big Negative To A Split  —  Democrats are having a mini-surge in Ohio as two possible candidates for the open U.S. Senate seat have come from behind to pass the Republican contender …

Holding back job growth?  Workers' awesome output  —  When workers become more efficient, it's normally a good thing.  But lately, it has acted as a powerful brake on job creation.  And the question of whether the recent surge in productivity has run its course is the key to whether job growth is finally poised to take off.

The Numbers Don't Lie  —  A Democratic senator I can't name, who reluctantly voted for the health-care bill out of loyalty to his party and his admiration for Barack Obama, privately complained to me that the measure was political folly, in part because of the way it goes into effect …

NASA Data Worse Than Climate-Gate Data, Space Agency Admits  —  NASA can put a man on the moon, but the space agency can't tell you what the temperature was back then.