A Time for Choosing  —  To govern is to choose.  To vote is to choose.  To vote against John Boehner on the House floor this week in the biggest showdown of the current Congress is to choose to vote with Nancy Pelosi.  To vote against Boehner is to choose to support Barack Obama.

Romney Leads Field of Announced GOP Candidates  —  Perry would be more competitive with Romney than Palin, Giuliani  —  PRINCETON, NJ — Mitt Romney is the leader for the GOP nomination among the current field of official candidates, supported by 27% of Republicans, compared with 18% for Michele Bachmann.

Credit hit worries Obama, Congress more than default  —  It's not the default that strikes the most fear in the White House and Congress these days.  It's the downgrade.  —  Even Republican leaders say the country can't go into default, and they'll do everything possible to raise the debt limit by Aug. 2.

U.S. officials believe al-Qaeda on brink of collapse  —  U.S. counterterrorism officials are increasingly convinced that the killing of Osama bin Laden and the toll of seven years of CIA drone strikes have pushed al-Qaeda to the brink of collapse.  —  The assessment reflects a widespread view …

The Cult That Is Destroying America  —  Watching our system deal with the debt ceiling crisis — a wholly self-inflicted crisis, which may nonetheless have disastrous consequences — it's increasingly obvious that what we're looking at is the destructive influence of a cult that has really poisoned our political system.

SwiftVets revenge  —  The Navy Times (no link) reported last week that Navy Secretary Ray Mabus stripped the Silver Star from a Vietnam swift boat veteran, Capt. Wade Sanders:  —  “Had the subsequently determined facts and evidence surrounding both the incident for which the award …

Not Leveling with Viewers  —  It's been said many times.  But it's never enough: the conventions of journalistic ‘objectivity’, as currently defined, frequently make journalists violate their biggest duty, which is honesty with readers.  The top headline running now on CNN reads …

Suicide blast kills mayor of Afghanistan's Kandahar  —  (Reuters) - A suicide bomber killed the mayor of Afghanistan's Kandahar city on Wednesday, two weeks after the assassination of Afghan President Hamid Karzai's brother in the same city created a power vacuum in the country's turbulent south.

US eco-activist jailed for two years  —  Campaigners denounce sentence of ‘hero’ Tim DeChristopher for disrupting oil and gas industry auction as excessive  —  An activist who became a hero to campaigners for disrupting a Bush administration auction for the oil and gas industry with $1.8m …

U.S. report: Russia tied to embassy blast in Georgia  —  Supports local findings  —  U.S. intelligence agencies concluded in a classified report late last year that Russia's military intelligence was responsible for a bomb blast that occurred at an exterior wall of the U.S. Embassy in Tbilisi, Georgia, in September.