Election 2012: Barack Obama 42%, Ron Paul 41%  —  Pit maverick Republican Congressman Ron Paul against President Obama in a hypothetical 2012 election match-up, and the race is - virtually dead even.  —  A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey of likely voters finds Obama with 42% support and Paul with 41% of the vote.

Denver radicals issue Tea Party crash call: “Cut loose and let these racist crackers know they are opposed.”  —  A Mumia-worshiping nutball group in Denver has just issued this Tea Party sabotage call: … “Cut loose?”  —  I hope law enforcement is on alert and on guard.  —  You'll love their logo:

Sen. Mark Warner: Mitch McConnell 'either doesn't understand or chooses not to understand'  —  When Sen. Mitch McConnell said that the Senate financial-regulation bill meant “endless taxpayer-funded bailouts for big Wall Street banks,” he was, knowingly or not, taking aim at a policy …

Yes, 47% of Households Owe No Taxes.  Look Closer.  —  Forty-seven percent.  —  That's the portion of American households that owe no income tax for 2009.  The number is up from 38 percent in 2007, and it has become a popular talking point on cable television and talk radio.

Anthony Weiner Goes Viral  —  Congressman Anthony Weiner bounded into a DJ booth at a fashionable Lower East Side bar one recent Wednesday night, grabbed the microphone with his left hand and unleashed his inner Borscht Belt.  —  “Every single moment that we are stroking our beards and gazing …

Arianna huffs about overbooked celebs at WHCD  —  Like a Real Housewife of New Jersey, Arianna Huffington was flipping tables, well, at least metaphorically.  —  Because like most media organizations that placed a bid for White House Correspondents dinner tables, the Huffington Post founder didn't get her way.

Andy Stern: The exit interview  —  Andy Stern is the president of SEIU, a service employees union with 2.2 million members.  He led the breakaway unions that split from the AFL-CIO and formed Change to Win, and he's been a key political player during the Obama era, visiting the White House more than any other individual.

Our Fill-in-the-Blank Constitution  —  AS the Senate awaits the nomination of a new Supreme Court justice, a frank discussion is needed on the proper role of judges in our constitutional system.  For 30 years, conservative commentators have persuaded the public that conservative judges apply the law …

Corrupt K Street Lobbyists Set Up A New Blue Dog Think Tank To Undermine Working Families  —  Blue Dogs are often most reviled for crossing the aisle and voting with Republicans on key issues like healthcare reform and financial reform.  Last November, when 39 Democrats voted against healthcare reform, for example, 25 were Blue Dogs.

Terry Gross: What I Read  —  How do other people deal with the torrent of information that pours down on us all?  Do they have some secret?  Perhaps.  We are asking various journalists who seem well-informed to describe their media diets.  This is from an exchange with Terry Gross …

Eliot Spitzer's flameout  —  (Fortune) — It was one of America's most shocking political sex scandals, instantly transforming New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer — who had terrified Wall Street during his political climb — into the infamous “Client 9.”  —  In Rough Justice, his new book out April 20 …

The Curious Cook: Why Cilantro Tastes Like Soap, for Some  —  FOOD partisanship doesn't usually reach the same heights of animosity as the political variety, except in the case of the anti-cilantro party.  The green parts of the plant that gives us coriander seeds seem to inspire …

Mike Huckabee Blasts Student Newspaper for ‘Sensationalizing’ Comments on Gay Marriage  —  ABC News' Huma Khan reports: In an unusual battlefront, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee is embroiled in a heated war of words with a college newspaper after telling a student reporter that it is …

Jane Mayer's Disaster  —  With her recent review of my book, Courting Disaster, Jane Mayer may have done a service to future generations of public servants.  The week her article appeared in The New Yorker, former CIA director Mike Hayden handed it out in his class at George Mason University's School …

Arizona Clears Strict Immigration Bill  —  Arizona lawmakers on Tuesday passed one of the toughest pieces of immigration-enforcement legislation in the country, which would make it a violation of state law to be in the U.S. without proper documentation.  —  It would also grant police the power …

Crist: A Path to Running as an Independent?  —  Florida Gov. Charlie Crist dodged another question Wednesday about whether he would run for the U.S. Senate as an independent, the Associated Press reports.  The question referenced this story in today's Wall Street Journal on how some of his advisers …

Why FL-19 isn't a health care referendum  —  In the immediate wake of soon-to-be Rep. Ted Deutch's (D) victory in a special election in Florida's 19th district on Tuesday, the Democratic National Committee released a statement casting it as a rejection of Republican claims that health care …

The single mother's manifesto  —  David Cameron says the ‘nasty party’ that castigated people like me has changed.  I'm not buying it  —  J.K. Rowling  —  I've never voted Tory before, but . . ." Those much parodied posters, with their photogenic subjects and their trite captions, remind me irresistibly of glossy greetings cards.

Prosecution: Blagojevich in near-constant conspiracy  —  Chicago, Illinois (CNN) — Former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich and his inner circle engaged in a near-constant conspiracy of extortion and kickbacks after his 2002 election, according to a court document released Wednesday that reveals details of the allegations against him.