Huckabee Letter: Obama Surrounds Himself “With Morally Repugnant Political Whores”  —  A letter sent by the group Citizens United, over Hucakbee's signature, says the day Obama was sworn into office is “the day the country started going to pot.”  Huckabee demands the letter be “pulled,” …

Marquette Law School Poll shows Walker, Kleefisch lead in recall  —  Milwaukee, Wis. - A new Marquette Law School Poll shows that with three weeks to go until the recall election Governor Scott Walker has taken a six-percentage point lead over Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, 50-44 percent, among likely voters.

Obama, Boehner clash at White House over debt-ceiling hike  —  President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) clashed during a White House meeting on Wednesday, with the Speaker telling the president that he was “not going to allow a debt-ceiling increase without doing something serious about the debt,” Boehner's office said.

How Mitt Romney gets away with his lying  —  Yesterday, Mitt Romney gave a big speech in which he accused Obama of lighting a “prairie fire of debt.”  It's a good line, and it has received widespread media coverage.  —  Romney's speech has already been dissected by Jonathan Chait and Steve Benen.

[UPDATED] The joke that Jimmy Kimmel didn't tell at the WHCA dinner … UPDATE: Tapper confirms to Dylan Stableford that he helped Kimmel:  —  “I tried to help Jimmy with the temperature of the room.  And yes, I thought that joke would cause the room to turn against him …

Obama budget defeated 99-0 in Senate  —  President Obama's budget suffered a second embarrassing defeat Wednesday, when senators voted 99-0 to reject it.  —  Coupled with the House's rejection in March, 414-0, that means Mr. Obama's budget has failed to win a single vote in support this year.

President Obama and Mitt Romney's common enemy  —  Barack Obama and Mitt Romney spend a lot of time trumpeting their differences, but they do share at least one common conviction: disdain for a political news media they see as eager to vaporize them for the sheer sport of it.

No media love for asymmetric polarization  —  “Polarization also has affected the two parties differently.  The Republican Party has drifted much farther to the right than the Democratic Party has drifted to the left.... In other words, the story of the past few decades is asymmetric polarization.”

Zimmerman Case - Keeping Hate Alive At The Times  —  The NY Times can't quite bring itself to report on the latest news in the Zimmerman case - Zimmerman's medical file shows he was banged up and Martin's autopsy showed bloody knuckles - so they hand the mike to the Ben Crump …

Sen. DeMint defends his role in upset in Nebraska's GOP Senate primary  —  Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) is not apologizing for spending hundreds of thousands of dollars through his leadership fund in Nebraska's Senate Republican primary, despite criticism from a Republican colleague.

Did a WikiLeaks document doom Iranian ‘Mossad agent’?  —  Leaked diplomatic cable apparently pointed to Majid Fashi, who was hanged in Tehran on Tuesday for allegedly killing a nuclear scientist  —  W  —  ikiLeaks may have been responsible for exposing Majid Jamali Fashi …

TPMMuckraker  —  Batty ‘Birther’ Movie Divides Conspiracy Diehards  —  “Birthers” are flipping their tinfoil hats over a new film that claims President Barack Obama's father was not a Kenyan goat herder but rather a communist journalist nearly four decades older than his mother.  The problem?

The 3 economic charts that could crash Obama's reelection hopes  —  Vice President Joe Biden is telling Ohio voters today that “things really are starting to come back.”  —  Is one of those “things” the U.S. economy?  Because as the following three charts show, the U.S. economy …

Buh-Bye  —  Over recent days we've been following the story of Eduardo Saverin, the co-founder of Facebook, now resident in Singapore, who has renounced his citizenship to avoid the big time tax bill that would have come with the Facebook IPO windfall.  But will Saverin ever be able to set in the US again?

Warning Signs in Wisconsin for Obama  —  In a potentially ominous sign for the Obama campaign, a new poll has declared Wisconsin a true tossup state, finding President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney locked in a 46%-46% tie among likely voters.  —  As the Obama team eyes potential paths to victory in November …

Mary Kennedy, RFK Jr.'s estranged wife, found dead  —  NEW YORK - Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s estranged wife, Mary Kennedy, who had fought drug and alcohol problems, was found dead in her home Wednesday.  —  Attorney Kerry Lawrence, who had represented her in a drunken-driving case, said he didn't know the cause of her death at age 52.

Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean gets in a car accident while on the air with CJAD  —  Former Vermont Governor and Democratic Party Presidential candidate Howard Dean was in Montreal today, attending a luncheon where he discussed the US presidential race between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney.

TPMDC  —  National Coalition For Men Endorses GOP Version Of VAWA Bill  —  House GOP legislation to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act got an unexpected endorsement Tuesday — one that Democrats couldn't be happier with.  —  In a letter to all members, provided to TPM by Democratic aides …

CNN Hits Lowest Primetime Demo Rating at 9 PM In 15 Years  —  Last night was a typical, boring Tuesday, with little earth-shattering news to drive TV viewers to cable news.  It was also May sweeps, with the season finale of “NCIS: LA,” “America's Got Talent” on NBC and “Dancing With the Stars” …