Dane County judge halts collective bargaining law  —  By Patrick Marley of the Journal Sentinel  —  Madison — Dane County Circuit Judge Maryann Sumi issued a temporary restraining order Friday, barring the publication of a controversial new law that would sharply curtail collective bargaining for public employees.

How Obama turned on a dime toward war  —  At the start of this week, the consensus around Washington was that military action against Libya was not in the cards.  However, in the last several days, the White House completely altered its stance and successfully pushed for the authorization …

GOP Bill Would Force IRS to Conduct Abortion Audits  —  Were you raped?  Was it incest?  And other questions the government's tax cops would have to ask women who've terminated pregnancies.  —  Post Comment  —  Under a GOP-backed bill expected to sail through the House of Representatives …

Support for Gay Marriage Reaches a Milestone  —  More Than Half of Americans Say Gay Marriage Should Be Legal  —  More than half of Americans say it should be legal for gays and lesbians to marry, a first in nearly a decade of polls by ABC News and The Washington Post.

President ‘Present’  —  Obama dodges the big decisions to keep his approval ratings up.  —  One knock on Barack Obama in the 2008 election was his record as an Illinois state senator, where he repeatedly ducked tough issues by voting “present.”  It seems old habits die hard.

The Forgotten Millions  —  More than three years after we entered the worst economic slump since the 1930s, a strange and disturbing thing has happened to our political discourse: Washington has lost interest in the unemployed.  —  Jobs do get mentioned now and then — and a few political figures …

Answering Mark Levin's Challenge  —  On his Facebook page, Mark Levin takes exception to some of us who have said critical words about Sarah Palin.  —  In his response, Mark groups Karl Rove, David Frum, and me, all of whom served in the Bush administration.

Exclusive Interview With Jim Shankman, the Man Behind the Ann Althouse Threat  —  Jim Shankman, the Madison-based author of a now notorious, vile Internet screed directed at blogger Ann Althouse and her husband, returned my call late last night and we spoke for approximately 30 - 40 minutes.

Bachmann accuses Weiner of trading in ‘fiction’ on budget.  His retort: 'I don't think you want to go there'  —  There's something about Anthony Weiner that seems to really get under Sean Hannity's skin.  Maybe it's the way he makes both Hannity and his guests look like utter buffoons.

Helen Thomas is Playboy's April Interview  —  A Candid Conversation with the Disgraced Dean of the White House Press Corps About her Rage against Israel, her Sympathy for Palestinians and Why she was Fired  —  /PRNewswire/ — “I knew exactly what I was doing - I was going for broke.

Half Would Vote Against Obama  —  Fully half of registered voters say they would definitely or probably vote for a candidate other than President Obama if the presidential election were held today, according to a new Allstate/National Journal Heartland Monitor poll.

Haley Barbour's son says he doesn't want father to make a White House run  —  WASHINGTON — The son of potential presidential contender Haley Barbour told a conservative columnist on Thursday that he hopes his father doesn't mount a White House bid.  —  In a personal e-mail to the columnist …

Obama cancels public speech in Rio square: embassy  —  President Barack Obama has cancelled a public speech he was scheduled to deliver Sunday in a Rio square during his upcoming visit to Brazil, the US embassy in Brasilia said.  —  The speech in the historic plaza known as Cinelandia …

Japan Raises Nuclear Crisis Warning Level Retroactively  —  TOKYO — Japanese engineers battled on Friday to cool spent fuel rods and restore electric power to pumps at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station as new challenges seemed to accumulate by the hour …

One-Third of a French Fry Short of a Big Mac Meal  —  How can we put the current debate over the federal budget into a tangible perspective that anyone can understand?  This morning I read a post by Dan Mitchell of the Cato Institute in which he criticized the Washington Post's characterization …

Sixty-four senators call on Obama to take up tax, entitlement reform  —  President Obama came under new pressure Friday to broaden talks about government spending to include tax and entitlement reform.  —  Sixty-four senators — 32 Democrats and 32 Republicans — called for the expanded talks in a letter to Obama.

Mend The Fed!  —  In the latest issue of Democracy: A Journal of Ideas I have a piece about progressives, the Federal Reserve, and the need to confront the centrality of monetary policy to economic issues: … Which is just to say that while there are a lot of greedy bastards in America …

Journalistic irony  —  On Wednesday, the Chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Gregory Jaczko, depicted the threat posed by Japanese nuclear reactors as much graver than had been suggested by Japanese officials.  Yesterday, this is how The New York Times described the impact …