Obama praises ‘tough as nails’ Pelosi at California fundraiser  —  (CNN) - Rep. Nancy Pelosi is a “visionary” leader who “never lets ideology cloud her judgment,” President Barack Obama told a crowd of donors in San Francisco Wednesday evening.  —  Obama is in the Golden State …

A viewer's guide to Clinton Fever  —  Will she run or won't she?  —  The obsessive speculation about Hillary Clinton's plans for 2016 promises to be the longest and most intense parlor game in the history of American politics.  It is a consuming fixation already, not just among the operatives …

U.S. Dials Back on Korean Show of Force  —  Administration ‘Playbook’ Outlined Publicized Exercises, but Officials Change Course Over Worries of North's Response  —  WASHINGTON—After a high-visibility display of military power aimed at deterring North Korean provocations …

Obama: ‘I Am Constrained By A System That Our Founders Put In Place’  —  DENVER (CBSDC/AP) — Ratcheting up pressure for Congress to limit access to guns, President Barack Obama said Wednesday that recent steps by Colorado to tighten its gun laws show “there doesn't have to be a conflict” …

Schools push a curriculum of propaganda  —  The real vocation of some people entrusted with delivering primary and secondary education is to validate this proposition: The three R's — formerly reading, 'riting and 'rithmetic — now are racism, reproduction and recycling.  Especially racism.

Gun poll: Most say background checks may bring confiscation  —  A plurality of Americans believe the federal government could use information gleaned from expanded background checks to confiscate legally-owned firearms, according to a Quinnipiac survey released Thursday.

He Wears the Mask  —  The present darling of the right wing, Dr. Benjamin Carson, is a distinguished neurosurgeon who went from the depths of Detroit poverty to the heights of Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.  But his current status among conservatives isn't so much rooted …

The President Gives Hollywood a Pass on Violence  —  Movies and videogames aren't high among White House concerns.  —  There was something missing from President Obama's Wednesday speech in Denver about gun violence.  He focused almost exclusively on passing gun-control laws …

Jobless claims at four-month high, cast shadow over labor market  —  (Reuters) - The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits hit a four-month high last week, suggesting the labor market recovery lost some steam in March.  —  Initial claims for state unemployment …

The New House Republican Web Strategy: Just Add BuzzFeed  —  What do cat pictures and GIFs have to do with Republican politics?  Not a whole lot, at least right now.  But beginning next week, that'll change.  —  Staffers at the National Republican Congressional Committee are finishing …

America Under the Gun  —  A 50-State Analysis of Gun Violence and Its Link to Weak State Gun Laws  —  Many of the states with the weakest gun laws also have the highest levels of gun violence.  —  Endnotes and citations are available in the PDF version of this report.

Remembering the Affair to Remember  —  It's kind of nice to have Mark Sanford back.  —  Perhaps not if you're from South Carolina.  It is my strong impression that many South Carolinians are tired of their former governor, who so famously snuck off to Argentina for some extramarital recreation …

$423,500 Stimulus Program on ‘Correct Condom Use’ Yields Zero Jobs  —  The details of a stimulus grant awarded to Indiana University to study condom use have now been released on a government website.  The study, titled “Barriers to Correct Condom Use,” is now completed, according to the website …

Now Even Politicians Can Be Divorced  —  From Sanford to Cuomo.  Four governors and 75 members of Congress aren't married, and voters don't seem to care.  —  Former South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford thanks his fiancée, Maria Belen Chapur, after winning the GOP nomination Tuesday for the U.S. House seat he once held.