Crack Pipe  —  I'm watching a lot of neoconservative policy activists and a lot of people in the press telling me that it's a very up in the air thing whether Chuck Hagel gets confirmed as Secretary of Defense.  These folks should stop smoking crack.  Because crack isn't good for you.

The Education of John Boehner  —  Leverage for the next clash: GOP willingness to let the spending sequester take effect.  —  What stunned House Speaker John Boehner more than anything else during his prolonged closed-door budget negotiations with Barack Obama was this revelation …

John Brennan tapped to lead CIA  —  President Barack Obama will announce Monday that he's nominating the White House's point person on counterterrorism, John Brennan, to be the next director of the Central Intelligence Agency, White House officials told POLITICO.

Man ID'd as Rand Paul's son arrested at airport  —  A teenager identified in several media outlets as the son of U.S. Sen. Rand Paul and the grandson of former presidential candidate Ron Paul was arrested Saturday morning at Charlotte Douglas International Airport.

Be Ready To Mint That Coin  —  Should President Obama be willing to print a $1 trillion platinum coin if Republicans try to force America into default?  Yes, absolutely.  He will, after all, be faced with a choice between two alternatives: one that's silly but benign, the other that's equally silly but both vile and disastrous.

The Outside Man  —  Yes, I've heard about the notion that I should be nominated as Treasury Secretary.  I'm flattered, but it really is a bad idea.  —  Part of the reason is that I am indeed the World's Worst Administrator — and that does matter.  Someone else can do the paperwork …

The Big Fail  —  It's that time again: the annual meeting of the American Economic Association and affiliates, a sort of medieval fair that serves as a marketplace for bodies (newly minted Ph.D.'s in search of jobs), books and ideas.  And this year, as in past meetings …

The conservative movement is still an elaborate moneymaking venture  —  The story of FreedomWorks' big Glenn Beck payout encapsulates the right-wing media  —  The conservative media movement exists primarily as a moneymaking venture.  As Rick Perlstein explained in the Baffler …

After Pinpointing Gun Owners, Paper Is a Target  —  WHITE PLAINS — Local newspapers across the country look for stories that will bring them national attention, but The Journal News, a daily nestled in a wooded office park in a suburb north of New York, may have gotten more than it bargained for.

Tea Party Senator: 'I Don't Think What Washington Needs Is More Compromise'  —  For the last two years, Republicans in Congress have achieved new levels of obstructionism never before seen in Washington, passing fewer bills than any other session of Congress since such information began being recorded in the 1940s.

CASTING VOTES  —  Here's a safe prediction for 2013: few people will pine for the Presidential campaign of 2012.  Even Barack Obama's most ardent supporters acknowledge that his victory provided little of the euphoria of four years ago.  Not many Republicans have longed to hear …

American Delegation Arrives in North Korea on Controversial Private Trip  —  SEOUL, South Korea — Bill Richardson, the former governor of New Mexico, led a private delegation including Eric Schmidt, Google's executive chairman, to North Korea on Monday, a controversial trip to a country that is among the most hostile to the Internet.