Is This Obama's Party?  —  The president didn't come up through Democratic Party institutions, and now he has little organic connection to it.  Not fair to compare him to Clinton, says Rendell.  —  (Getty Images / John Gress)  —  President Barack Obama took over the country in 2008 …

How Change Happens  —  Forty years ago, corporate America was bloated, sluggish and losing ground to competitors in Japan and beyond.  But then something astonishing happened.  Financiers, private equity firms and bare-knuckled corporate executives initiated a series of reforms and transformations.

EXCLUSIVE: THE VETTING - DID OBAMA HAVE LOWER SAT SCORES THAN GEORGE W. BUSH?  —  President Barack Obama is hailed by his supporters and the mainstream media as one of the most brilliant men ever to hold the office.  However, his refusal to release his academic records …

Obama spending binge never happened  —  Commentary: Government outlays rising at slowest pace since 1950s … WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — Of all the falsehoods told about President Barack Obama, the biggest whopper is the one about his reckless spending spree.

THIS JUST IN  —  A video posted online that shows a former union leader in South Carolina smashing a piñata effigy of Gov. Nikki Haley has riled the national office of the AFL-CIO, which wants it taken down.  —  “Do you think we can get this video pulled,” asked a national AFL-CIO official …

General Colin Powell, who served as secretary of state under President George W. Bush, talks to TODAY's Matt Lauer about politics, war and his new book, “It Worked for Me.”  —  Though he believes President Obama has had several significant achievements during his first term …

New Republican Ad Takes a Soft Shot at Obama  —  WASHINGTON — The ad is the work of two of the most fearsome players in Republican politics: Larry McCarthy, the producer behind the infamous Willie Horton commercial in 1988, and Crossroads GPS, the political battle squad founded by Karl Rove.

Americans, Including Catholics, Say Birth Control Is Morally OK  —  Birth control has the broadest acceptance among 18 behaviors  —  PRINCETON, NJ — Eighty-two percent of U.S. Catholics say birth control is morally acceptable, nearing the 89% of all Americans and 90% of non-Catholics who agree.

NBC/WSJ poll: Obama's gay-marriage announcement a ‘draw’  —  Two weeks after President Obama announced he supports gay marriage, a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll shows that his announcement — politically — looks to be a wash.  —  In the poll, a combined 17 percent says it makes them …

Coming soon: Bristol Palin's reality show  —  Bristol Palin's reality show premieres next month, Lifetime announced in a press release on Tuesday:

That's my favorite kind of headline, because all I have to do is present the relevant facts.  This is hardly the first time “CNN” and “dog poop” have been used in the same sentence, but this time it's literal.  —  CBS Atlanta: … But it gets even better, as David Stein discovered:

40% Now Say Trayvon Martin Shot in Self-Defense; 24% Say It Was Murder  —  As evidence continues to emerge from the shooting death of Florida teenager Trayvon Martin, Americans are becoming more convinced that his killer acted in self-defense and that the legal system will come to that conclusion.

Kleiner Perkins Sued By Partner Ellen Pao, Alleging Sexual Harassment, Gender Discrimination  —  Kleiner Perkins Caulfield and Byers, one of the most storied and well-respected venture capital firms in Silicon Valley, has been sued by Ellen Pao, an investment partner with the firm.

Gingrich's private ventures are going bankrupt  —  (Reuters) - ATLANTA - When he entered the race for the Republican presidential nomination in May 2011, Newt Gingrich was the prosperous head of a small empire commonly known as Newt Inc, which included both for-profit consultancies and nonprofit foundations.

Black Mormons and the Politics of Identity  —  SALT LAKE CITY — When Marguerite Driessen, a professor here, entered Brigham Young University in the early 1980s, she was the first black person many Mormon students had ever met, and she spent a good bit of her college time debunking stereotypes about African-Americans.

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Wonkbook: Obama's gay marriage bump  —  “There's been a dramatic zero-point shift in the polls since Obama came out for gay marriage,” tweeted Nate Silver on Monday.  —  The tweet wasn't attached to a post or to a particular poll, but we can run some of the numbers on our own.

Ode to My Best Friend — Mary Richardson Kennedy  —  I met Mary on her first day at Putney, we were 15.  The next weekend we hitch hiked to Boston to see my siblings Michael, Bobby, David, Courtney and Kathleen, and for the rest of her life, she spent nearly every weekend and vacation with our family.

Gridlock eases in many metro areas  —  Traffic congestion dropped 30% last year from 2010 in the USA's 100 largest metropolitan areas, driven largely by higher gas prices and a spotty economic recovery, according to a new study by a Washington-state firm that tracks traffic flows.