Top Items:

The Proposition 8 oral argument — Much will be written about the Proposition 8 oral argument. The bottom line, in my opinion, is that the Court probably will not have the five votes necessary to get to any result at all, and almost certainly will not have five votes to decide the merits of whether Proposition 8 is constitutional.
Discussion:
The Huffington Post, Reuters, Mother Jones, his vorpal sword, Zandar Versus The Stupid, American Foundation …, ProfessorBainbridge.com, Washington Wire, National Review, Washington Monthly, The Week, Power Line, Towleroad News #gay, Outside the Beltway, Gawker, The PJ Tatler, Angry Bear, Talking Points Memo, The Dish, Alas, a Blog, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Althouse, The Maddow Blog, Washington Post, Post Politics, The Daily Beast, The Rumpus.net, Taylor Marsh and Freedom to Marry Blog
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Here Are the 7 Worst Things Antonin Scalia Has Said or Written About Homosexuality — This week the Supreme Court will hear arguments about equal rights for gay Americans. But we already know what Scalia thinks. — Justice Antonin Scalia has written that “it is our moral heritage …

Argument recap: On marriage, Kennedy in control — Analysis — Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, in an unusually candid process of elimination of options in public, on Tuesday worked his way through the ways for dealing with California's Proposition 8 ban on same-sex marriage and seemed strongly tempted to just take a pass.


Jon Tester backs same-sex marriage — Montana Sen. Jon Tester on Tuesday endorsed same-sex marriage, joining the party's new public consensus on the issue. — Tester joins Sens. Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Mark Warner of Virginia in endorsing same-sex nuptials, and Jay Rockefeller …
Discussion:
ABCNEWS, Hot Air, The National Memo and Taylor Marsh

Supreme Court justices signal dodge on gay marriage ruling — The Supreme Court indicated Tuesday that it's unlikely to issue a broad ruling on same-sex marriage. — Several justices seemed to be looking for ways to avoid a sweeping ruling — or perhaps even a ruling at all …

Why Gay Marriage Will Win, and Sexual Freedom Will Lose — In the future, gay marriage will not only be legal, but practically mandatory. — In some sense, it doesn't really matter how the Supreme Court rules on the gay marriage case it's hearing today. The culture war is over on this front, and gay marriage has won.
Discussion:
Via Meadia and Democracy in America


How Opinion on Same-Sex Marriage Is Changing, and What It Means
Discussion:
Runnin' Scared, SCOTUSblog, New Republic, The Maddow Blog, New York Times and PostPartisan

Supreme Court Sharply Divided On Whether States May Ban Gay Marriage
Discussion:
Advocate, The Week and Taylor Marsh

The reducio ad absurdum of American constitutional jurisprudence
Discussion:
National Review and Pundit & Pundette

Bill Clinton's Decision, and Regret, on Defense of Marriage Act
Discussion:
ABCNEWS, Gawker, NewsBusters blogs, BuzzFeed, Yahoo! News, The Times of Israel, CNN, JustOneMinute, ABCNEWS and The Caucus

Deciding Not to Decide Gay Marriage
Discussion:
Guardian, Business Insider, No More Mister Nice Blog and Towleroad News #gay

The Justices Are Not Ready To Bring Marriage Equality To Alabama, And They Want Prop 8 To Go Away
Discussion:
Mediaite

Supreme Court Justices Appear Cautious On Same-Sex Marriage Rights
Discussion:
Firedoglake

. . . Gays Deserve Equal Rights
Discussion:
Bloomberg, SCOTUSblog, Hit & Run, Althouse, Law Blog, Post Politics, msnbc.com and AMERICAblog

Can gay marriage survive SCOTUS loss?
Discussion:
Yahoo! News, ABCNEWS, ABCNEWS, Hot Air, CNN, Daily Kos, National Review, New York Times, The Plum Line and The Huffington Post


How not to seem like a racist — A tip for right-wingers angry about charges of racial bias: Try treating the Obama daughters with decency — Writing my piece on Andrew Breitbart and Tucker Carlson, I missed a huge example of overlap between their two sham-empires: the reporter who broke …
Discussion:
Mediaite, Weasel Zippers, Crooks and Liars and Joe. My. God.
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Obama to name Julia Pierson as new Secret Service director — President Obama will appoint Julia Pierson, a veteran U.S. Secret Service agent and senior official, as the first female director of the agency, White House officials said Tuesday. — Pierson, 53, began her career in the Secret Service …
Discussion:
Taylor Marsh and The Raw Story
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Despite Abortion Bans, TRAP Law Is the Real Threat to Abortion Access in North Dakota (UPDATED) … “Personhood,” heartbeat bans, forcing women to give birth to babies diagnosed with genetic anomalies that make them unlikely to survive long after birth, if they make it that long …
Discussion:
ThinkProgress, Daily Kos, msnbc.com and Wonkblog
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North Dakota Governor Signs Strict Abortion Limits
Discussion:
The Week

Steele: Priebus ‘crapping’ on my legacy — Former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele continued to feud with his successor Reince Priebus on Tuesday, accusing the current chairman of “crapping” on his legacy. — “I kept my mouth shut for two years because, hey …
Discussion:
Politico
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Huckabee: Evangelicals Will Leave If GOP Backs Gay Marriage
Discussion:
NationalJournal.com, Hot Air, Mediaite, The Week, The Daily Caller, Hawkings Here, BuzzFeed and Wall Street Journal

South Carolina special a toss up — PPP's first look at the special election in South Carolina's 1st Congressional District finds a toss up race. Democrat Elizabeth Colbert Busch leads Republican Mark Sanford 47-45 and ties Curtis Bostic at 43. — This is a Republican leaning district …
Discussion:
The Other McCain, The Week, Politico, Right Turn, Hot Air, Washington Monthly, Mediaite, The National Memo, Daily Kos, Roll Call and The Post and Courier


Actor Jake McClain Tweeting Every Word Of 906-Page ‘Obamacare’ Health Reform Law — Actor and director Jake McClain has taken on the monumental task of tweeting every single word of the 906-page “Obamacare” health reform law in hopes of drawing attention to the bill's content …
Discussion:
No More Mister Nice Blog


Egyptian mosque turned into house of torture for Christians after Muslim Brotherhood protest — Islamic hard-liners stormed a mosque in suburban Cairo, turning it into torture chamber for Christians who had been demonstrating against the ruling Muslim Brotherhood in the latest case …
Discussion:
Weasel Zippers and The Gateway Pundit

Alito's provocative question — I'm still working my way through the transcript (pdf) of today's Supreme Court oral argument on California's Prop 8, but there's one quote that already seems to be generating quite a bit of attention. It comes by way of Justice Samuel Alito:

The Killing Chain — Let's say you were writing a novel about a homicide. You'd want to describe the killer's neighborhood and family background. You'd want to describe his school, his culture and his gang. — You'd want to describe how he got into crime, his prior arrests …
Discussion:
msnbc.com, NewsBusters blogs and Mother Jones


The Weeklies — From the outside, it is hard to know that people live in the Ramada Inn. The parking lot is always empty. The hotel sits facing a wide suburban boulevard called Kipling Street, just off Interstate 70 in Wheat Ridge, Colorado. The interchange where Kipling meets the freeway …
Discussion:
The Impolitic, Hullabaloo and Eschaton


David Keene, NRA President, Has No Regrets About Newtown Massacre Response — WASHINGTON — “We had to change the subject,” said David Keene, as if making an obvious, unobjectionable point. — We were sitting at the back table of his favorite Italian restaurant.
Discussion:
Daily Kos and Weekly Standard


North Korea threatens Hawaii and U.S. mainland — NORTH KOREA THREAT — North Korea, which has missiles capable of hitting U.S. territories in the Pacific and possibly mainland USA, has ordered its rocket and long-range artillery units to be combat ready after joint military drills by U.S. and South Korean forces.
Discussion:
The Gateway Pundit and Firedoglake

Study: Health overhaul to raise claims cost 32 pct — WASHINGTON (AP) — Insurance companies will have to pay out an average of 32 percent more for medical claims on individual health policies under President Barack Obama's overhaul, the nation's leading group of financial risk analysts has estimated.
Discussion:
The Lonely Conservative and National Republican …