President Obama intervenes in budget standoff  —  President Obama phones the House speaker and the Senate leader in an effort to broker a Republican-Democratic deal to avert a government shutdown.  —  Reporting from Washington —  As the budget stalemate lingered …

Charlie Sheen's Detroit disaster: Boos, walk-outs for ‘Torpedo of Truth’  —  First the U.S. automaker recession, and now this.  Charlie Sheen unleashed his Violent Torpedo of Truth Tour on the Motor City on Saturday night to a crowd that began with an adoring standing ovation and concluded with booing and walk-outs.

Have a Rotten Eggroll, Mr. Goldstone  —  So Richard Goldstone, the South African jurist who fronted the U.N. report bearing his name that alleged massive Israeli war crimes in the Gaza war of 2008-2009, has taken to the pages of the Washington Post to say, in effect, “never mind”:

In St. Louis, a protest sign meets government arrogance  —  A dialectic of judicial deference and political arrogance is on display in St. Louis.  When excessively deferential courts permit governmental arrogance, additional arrogance results as government explores the limits of judicial deference.

Absorbent yet to soak up radioactive water at Fukushima plant  —  Workers tried Sunday to block the leakage of highly radioactive water into the sea from the crisis-hit Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant by injecting polymeric water absorbent that can soak up 50 times its volume …

Illinois Workers Find That a Death Penalty Ban Abolishes Their Jobs, Too  —  The day after the death penalty was abolished in Illinois in early March, Wendi Liss received a call from one of her clients, who was facing trial for murder and the prospect of being executed if found guilty.

Dirty billions and Mexico's drugs war  —  As the violence spread, billions of dollars of cartel cash began to seep into the global financial system.  But a special investigation by the Observer reveals how the increasingly frantic warnings of one London whistleblower were ignored

Free-Market Solutions for Overweight Americans  —  Sometimes we find it easy to identify a problem and impossible to think of a solution.  Obesity is a good example.  Almost everybody agrees that it is a growing burden on health systems and that it requires urgent attention from policy makers.

Joseph Stiglitz: The Fate of The Top 1% Is Bound Up With How The Other 99% Live  —  Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed that America's top economists are running around with their hair on fire?  (Or whatever passes for it with economists.)  Nobel Prize winner Joe Stiglitz in Vanity Fair sounds …

Cutting Out the Middleman  —  For six years, Doug Stafford was a lobbyist for the National Right to Work Committee, an anti-labor group financed by business and conservative interests.  His job changed last year but his duties did not when he became the chief of staff to Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky.

Libyan rebels struggle to explain rift  —  Gallery: Conflict and chaos in Libya: As international airstrikes continue against forces loyal to Moammar Gaddafi, rebels face difficult battle.  —  BENGHAZI, Libya — Libya's rebel military struggled Saturday to explain an apparent rift within …

List of health reform waivers keeps growing  —  The number of waivers the Obama administration has awarded for a provision of the year-old healthcare reform law grew by 128 in March.  —  With the new waivers, that means 1,168 businesses, insurers, unions and other organizations have received …

Mitt's health care defense  —  LAS VEGAS — Mitt Romney directly addressed the Obama administration's backhanded plaudits of his Massachusetts health care law Saturday, defending the law's controversial individual mandate for the first time and promising that it wouldn't impede an aggressive attack …

An Obama Insider, Running the Race From Afar  —  CHICAGO — For two years, Jim Messina worked 41 steps from the Oval Office, a distance he counted when he first arrived at the White House.  His next assignment — in an office 700 miles from President Obama — will test whether proximity is the key to power.

Huckabee wins 2012 county straw poll in South Carolina  —  Washington (CNN) - Mike Huckabee won a 2012 presidential straw poll conducted in a key South Carolina county Saturday.  —  The informal vote was the first of many upcoming straw polls taking place this month at grassroots GOP …