U.S. Adds 290,000 Jobs in April; Rate Rises to 9.9%  —  The American economy added an unexpectedly strong 290,000 jobs in April, while the unemployment rate rose to 9.9 percent, the government said Friday.  —  Analysts had expected a gain of about 190,000 in the month.

Obama's Court pick is imminent — POTUS to seek line-item veto — Britain sorting out ‘hung parliament’ — Did Dow tank on ‘fat finger error’?  — Palin + Facebook = Yahtzee  —  DRIVING NEXT WEEK — Look for President Obama to name his Supreme Court pick Monday, and look …

My Interview With Jo-Vanni Roman  —  Around 1am this morning I got tipped by one of the guys at Unzipped that Jo-Vanni Roman was finally ready to speak with me.  Five minutes later I had him on the phone from Fort Lauderdale, but not before I alerted Father Tony to be ready to rush over to him immediately for a video interview.

Brown ‘respects’ Clegg-Tory talks  —  Gordon Brown has said he “respects” the right of the Lib Dems to talk to the Tories about forming a government.  —  But he said he was still PM and, if talks failed, would open negotiations with the Lib Dems, after the election resulted in a hung parliament.

Al Franken takes over the U.S. Senate floor to explain a newspaper cartoon to the waiting nation  —  All we can say is thank goodness Minnesota's newest Democratic U.S. senator, Al Franken, was on duty Thursday.  —  We were poring through one of America's most glorious man-caused treasures …

Senate Votes For Wall Street; Megabanks To Remain Behemoths  —  What's Your Reaction: … A move to break up major Wall Street banks failed Thursday night by a vote of 61 to 33.  —  Three Republicans, Richard Shelby of Alabama, Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and John Ensign of Nevada …

The Surge of Ideas  —  COINdinistas and Change in the U.S. Army in 2006 … Good evening to you all.  Thanks for that warm welcome.  And thanks, Arthur, for that very kind introduction.  —  Earlier today, as I was talking with my wife about tonight's speech, she reminded me of a story …

GOP takes jab at Democrats' ‘luck’ in fighting terrorism  —  Two days after the dramatic arrest of Times Square bombing suspect Faisal Shahzad, Republicans were engaged in a full-bore effort to rewrite the good-news narrative.  —  “Yes, we have been lucky,” House Minority Leader John A. Boehner …

For Airport Security, Size Matters  —  Cops: New high-tech screener triggered fight over manhood insult  —  A Transportation Security Administration screener is facing an assault rap after he allegedly beat a co-worker who joked about the size of the man's genitalia after he walked through a security scanner.

Secret holds are not the problem (but the Democrats would like to make them the problem)  —  I've never been able to get a straight answer on why, exactly, senators should be able to place anonymous holds on nominees.  I can see the arguments for holds themselves: They allow senators …

High-Speed Trading Glitch Costs Investors Billions  —  The glitch that sent markets tumbling Thursday was years in the making, driven by the rise of computers that transformed stock trading more in the last 20 years than in the previous 200.  —  The old system of floor traders matching buyers …

Graham Calls for ‘Pause’ in Pursuing Energy Bill  —  WASHINGTON — Senator Lindsey Graham, one of the chief sponsors of a nascent plan to address energy and climate change in the Senate, said Friday that the proposal had no chance of passage in the near term and called for a “pause” in consideration of the issue.

Bill Targets Citizenship of Terrorists' Allies  —  WASHINGTON — Proposed legislation that would allow the government to revoke American citizenship from people suspected of allying themselves with terrorists set off a legal and political debate Thursday that scrambled some of the usual partisan lines on civil-liberties issues.

Regulator Deferred to Oil Industry on Offshore Rig Safety  —  WASHINGTON — Federal regulators warned offshore rig operators more than a decade ago that they needed to install backup systems to control the giant undersea valves known as blowout preventers, used to cut off the flow of oil from a well in an emergency.

Time to plan for war  —  So much for US President Barack Obama's famed powers of persuasion.  At the UN's Nuclear Non-Poliferation Treaty review conference which opened this week, the Obama administration managed to lose control over the agenda before the conference even started.

Video: “I never thought I'd be on national TV for wearing an American flag shirt”  —  Via Greg Hengler, this interviews distills the ridiculous nature of Live Oak High School's action to its core.  Martha MacCallum interviews two of the students disciplined for wearing clothing …

This is Your War on Drugs  —  Andrew has already posted this, and I'm late to the game because I couldn't bring myself to watch it, but nonetheless, I feel compelled to remark.  Yes, folks, this is your war on drugs:  —  After he watched it, my more temperate better half was literally shaking with anger.

Grand Old Party  —  For reasons that have always struck me as paradoxical, one place where Republicans totally excel Democrats is in their ability to survive sex scandals.  Admittedly, Bill Clinton managed to get that ball pretty far down the field for the Democrats in the 1990s.  God bless'em.

AN INANE LOOK AT THE NATIONAL DAY OF PRAYER.... Yesterday was the official “National Day of Prayer,” held annually on the first Thursday in May by congressional decree.  The “holiday,” such as it is, was a little more noticeable this year than most because of a recent federal court ruling …