Republicans take 4 of 6 in recall elections, hold Senate  —  Both sides see victories in hard-fought contests  —  By Tom Tolan and Patrick Marley of the Journal Sentinel  —  Democrats won two state Senate seats in Tuesday's historic recall elections, but failed to capture a third seat …

New CNN Poll: Majority want tax increase for wealthy and deep spending cuts  —  Washington (CNN) - Most Americans want a special congressional committee tasked with drafting a long-term solution to the nation's mounting federal deficits to include tax hikes for the wealthy and businesses …

Withholder in Chief  —  Even the Butter Cow at the Iowa State Fair is not enough to sweeten the mood.  —  Three years ago, Barack Obama's unlikely presidential dream was given wings by rapturous Iowans — young, old and in-between — who saw in the fresh-faced, silky-voiced black senator …

King: Probe W.H. role in Osama movie  —  House Homeland Security Chairman Peter King (R-N.Y.) on Wednesday demanded an investigation into a report that the White House is cooperating with a film on the mission to kill Osama bin Laden.  —  In a letter to the Defense Department and the CIA …

John Boehner and Mitch McConnell's super committee picks  —  The top Republican congressional leaders have appointed six members to the deficit reduction “super committee,” naming a half-dozen lawmakers with conservative policy credentials to make up the GOP half of the panel charged reducing …

The Day Our Leaders Got Unstuck  —  This is a scary economic moment.  The response we need is not easy, but it is totally obvious.  We need a Grand Bargain between America's two parties — and we need it right now.  Until you read the following news article, we'll be stuck in a world of hurt.

Tea Party Made Up of ‘Freaked Out White Men’: Whitney  —  Tea Party members are primarily “freaked out white men” who pose the greatest political threat to Democrats in 2012, according to banking analyst Meredith Whitney.  —  Speaking in the broader context of a discussion on CNBC regarding …

Santorum: Marriage Is Like Water, Not Beer  —  Rick Santorum turned more than a few eyebrows on Monday when he explained his opposition to same-sex marriage by holding up a napkin and observing that it was not a paper towel.  On Friday, during a meeting with the Des Moines Register …

Michele Bachmann Repeatedly Sought Stimulus, EPA, Other Government Funds … WASHINGTON — Few candidates in the Republican presidential primary field have decried the federal government with as much gusto as Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.).  The three-term congresswoman has belittled the stimulus package …

Jon Huntsman for President  —  In 2008, Florida and the presidency went to Barack Obama because he offered hope.  To defeat the President in 2012, we need a candidate who will offer solutions.  That man is Jon Huntsman.  —  Today at 11:15 a.m. at Scotty's Landing in Miami …

The Secret History of Guns  —  The Ku Klux Klan, Ronald Reagan, and, for most of its history, the NRA all worked to control guns.  The Founding Fathers?  They required gun ownership—and regulated it.  And no group has more fiercely advocated the right to bear loaded weapons in public …

Pay Television Faces ‘Toxic Mix’ as Subscribers Cancel in Record Numbers  —  The six largest publicly traded U.S. cable and satellite-TV providers combined to lose about 580,000 customers in the second quarter, the biggest such decline in history, according to company and Bloomberg data.

A New Strategy for Economic Growth  —  Growth is not just about economics.  Growth unleashes human potential.  —  As the economy continues to struggle, we are reminded of a course offered at Yale University titled “Grand Strategy.”  Drawing on a weighty curriculum of history and philosophy …

A Fox News Science Lesson  —  Those who watched Fox News over the weekend were treated to a brief but ambitious science lesson on “Why CO2 Can't Cause Warming”:  —  Oh boy.  Let's take these one at a time.  —  During the segment Fox's global warming expert, Joe Bastardi …

Poll surprise: Weiner seat in play  —  New York Democrat David Weprin holds a surprisingly narrow lead over Republican Bob Turner in the Sept. 13 special election to replace former Democratic Rep. Anthony Weiner, according to a new Siena Research Institute poll.

Tucsonans give McCain earful  —  If U.S. Sen. John McCain's town hall on Tuesday had a theme, it's that Greater Tucson has been dipped in a big vat of angry.  —  And the heat isn't just the domain of the tea party any more, with progressives showing up in force, just as torqued as their conservative counterparts.

Judge fines ACORN $5,000 for voter registration scheme  —  A judge Wednesday slapped the defunct grass-roots community organizing group ACORN with a maximum $5,000 fine for its role in a voter registration compensation scheme in the 2008 election cycle.  —  District Judge Donald Mosley …

A Test for Obama's View of a One-Term Presidency  —  WASHINGTON — It was a year and a half ago when President Obama told Diane Sawyer of ABC News in an interview that he would rather be a good one-term president than a mediocre two-term president.  —  Now, coming off one of his worst weeks …

Running against the GOP  —  The Democratic National Committee, in a memo out shortly, points to the unpopularity of the Congressional GOP:  —  Today's Republican Party becoming less popular than during impeachment is no small feat.  After all, impeachment was a year-long circus that divided the country …

Most Americans believe U.S. on wrong track: poll  —  (Reuters) - Economic fears are weighing heavily on Americans, with a large majority saying the United States is on the wrong track and nearly half believing the worst is yet to come, a Reuters/Ipsos poll said Wednesday.

How to make the best of the long malaise  —  The only good thing about the continuing barrage of bad economic news is that it could have been worse: all three rating agencies could have downgraded the US, stock markets could have fallen further and the US could have defaulted on its debt.