Obama ‘amused’ by Tea Party rallies  —  President Barack Obama struck a hyperpartisan note Thursday, telling Democrats that he was “amused” by the Tax Day Tea Party rallies.  —  Obama, addressing a Democratic National Committee (DNC) fundraiser in Miami, did little to endear himself …

White House complains about CBS News blog post saying that possible Supreme Court nominee is gay  —  The White House ripped CBS News on Thursday for publishing an online column by a blogger who made assertions about the sexual orientation of Solicitor General Elena Kagan, widely viewed as a leading candidate for the Supreme Court.

Obama orders hospitals to grant same-sex couples visitation rights  —  President Obama on Thursday signed a memorandum requiring hospitals to allow gays and lesbians to have non-family visitors and to grant their partners medical power of attorney.  —  The president ordered the Department …

The Fire Next Time  —  On Tuesday, Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader, called for the abolition of municipal fire departments.  —  Firefighters, he declared, “won't solve the problems that led to recent fires.  They will make them worse.”  The existence of fire departments …

C.I.A. Document Details Destruction of Tapes  —  WASHINGTON — Porter J. Goss, the former director of the Central Intelligence Agency, in 2005 approved of the decision by one of his top aides to destroy dozens of videotapes documenting the brutal interrogation of two detainees, according to an internal C.I.A. document released Thursday.

U.S. SENATE RACE: Poll: Reid loses full ballot test  —  Third-party, nonpartisan candidates have little impact  —  U.S. Sen. Harry Reid must pick up far more support from crossover Republicans and independents to win re-election, according to a new poll that shows him losing to the GOP front-runner …

Fox News yanks Sean Hannity from Cincinnati Tea Party rally he was set to star in  —  Angry Fox News executives ordered host Sean Hannity to abandon plans to broadcast his nightly show as part of a Tea Party rally in Cincinnati on Thursday after top executives learned that he was set to headline the event …

DNC Pledges $50 Million for Midterms  —  ABC News' Teddy Davis reports: A Democratic Party official confirms that the DNC will contribute over $50 million in cash and services for the midterm elections (House, Senate, and gubernatorial races).  —  In making this announcement about the DNC's plans …

Former Sen. Mack withdraws as Crist campaign chair  —  TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Gov. Charlie Crist's political mentor, former U.S. Sen. Connie Mack, resigned Thursday as Crist's campaign chairman in his race for the U.S. Senate.  —  Mack wrote a terse, two-paragraph letter to his one-time protege …

Dueling Columnists  —  A surprising disagreement has broken out between two Times columnists, with Paul Krugman demanding an apology from Andrew Ross Sorkin and Sorkin so far refusing to back down.  —  The argument is over what approach Krugman, the Nobel Prize-winning economist who writes …

Lawyer: Laptops took thousands of images  —  The system that Lower Merion school officials used to track lost and stolen laptops wound up secretly capturing thousands of images, including photographs of students in their homes, Web sites they visited, and excerpts of their online chats …

New House Ratings: 44 Seats Moved Toward GOP  —  We are still seven months until the midterm elections, so there is at least some possibility that the landscape could shift or that Democratic attacks on the GOP could keep Republican gains down to a minimum.  —  Substantial Republican gains …

Merrill Lynch's $50 billion feud … (Fortune) — For Stan O'Neal, late August 2007 was a period of great anxiety.  The chairman and CEO of Merrill Lynch was vacationing at his home on Martha's Vineyard and, as the world would later learn, playing a lot of golf.

Recalling '95 Bombing, Clinton Sees Parallels  —  WASHINGTON — With the 15th anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing approaching, former President Bill Clinton on Thursday drew parallels between the antigovernment tone that preceded that devastating attack and the political tumult of today …

‘Tea party’ protesters gather in Washington to rally against taxes, spending  —  Thousands of conservative “tea party” activists streamed into the nation's capital Thursday to protest Obama administration policies and denounce what they regard as excessive taxation and government spending.

Obama's nuclear strutting and fretting  —  There was something oddly disproportionate about the just-concluded nuclear summit to which President Obama summoned 46 world leaders, the largest such gathering on American soil since 1945.  That meeting was about the founding of the United Nations …

Lobbyists and Lawmakers Bond During Springsteen Concerts  —  by Marcus Stern and Sebastian Jones, ProPublica -  —  WASHINGTON, D.C. - As Bruce Springsteen belted out his working-class anthems on the floor of the Verizon Center last May, Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., chair of the House Highways …

Imam and Informant Tells Why He Lied  —  Ahmad Wais Afzali, after his sentencing on Thursday.  Mr. Afzali avoided imprisonment, but he must leave the country.  —  He had built a life in this country.  He grew up in Queens, attended high school there, and became a religious leader in his community.

Graft Feeds Greek Crisis  —  ATHENS—Behind the budget crisis roiling Greece lies a riddle: Why does the state spend so lavishly but collect taxes so poorly?  Many Greeks say the answer needs only two words: fakelaki and rousfeti.  —  Fakelaki is the Greek for “little envelopes,” …

Steve King Blows Up, Physically Grabs TP Blogger When Asked About His Justification Of IRS Attack  —  In February, a software engineer named Joseph Stack flew a small aircraft into an IRS building in Texas, killing two people and leaving another two hospitalized.

Gov: Health Connector chief stepping down  —  Jon Kingsdale, the executive director of the Commonwealth Health Insurance Connector Authority, the state agency that helps people in Massachusetts find health insurance, is leaving his job, Gov. Deval Patrick has announced.

The heart and soul of Israel  —  It is not a perfect analogy, but imagine King George III asking America's founding fathers to surrender Philadelphia in exchange for ending the Revolutionary War.  America's birthplace, including Independence Hall, where the Declaration of Independence was signed, would fly the Union Jack.

The Madison, Wisconsin, Tax Day Tea Party  —  More pictures coming soon.  I'd put them all up right away, but I had to work late and my wife made barbeque pork chops for dinner.  I have my priorities.  —  And anyway, this is the one you're all waiting for.  The crowd shot:

Shahien Nasiripour  —  WHAT'S YOUR REACTION?  —  A third top Fed official is calling for megabanks to be broken up.  —  James Bullard, president and chief executive of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, echoed the call of Kansas City Fed President Thomas M. Hoenig …