Obama's Counsel Told of IRS Audit Findings Weeks Ago  —  The White House's chief lawyer learned weeks ago that an audit of the Internal Revenue Service likely would show that agency employees inappropriately targeted conservative groups, a senior White House official said Sunday.

A rare peek into a Justice Department leak probe  —  When the Justice Department began investigating possible leaks of classified information about North Korea in 2009, investigators did more than obtain telephone records of a working journalist suspected of receiving the secret material.

UPDATED: Virginia GOP Nominee For Attorney General Introduced Bill Forcing Women To Report Their Miscarriages To Police  —  If a woman in Virginia has a miscarriage without a doctor present, they must report it within 24 hours to the police or risk going to jail for a full year.

On Yahoo-Tumblr  —  It now looks pretty certain that Yahoo has pulled off a deal to buy Tumblr for 1.1B.  The relationship between WordPress and Tumblr has always been pretty friendly: Tumblr's own blog used to be on WP, WordPress.com supports Tumblr as a Publicize option alongside Twitter and Facebook …

Three Signs There's a Cover-Up  —  The late columnist William Safire once said that a good clue that someone in Washington was engaged in “an artful dodge,” i.e., a cover-up, was that they used the phrase “mistakes were made.”  Safire defined it as a “passive-evasive way of acknowledging error …

7 Juicy Claims From A Romney Campaign Insider's New Book  —  Former policy aide Gabriel Schoenfeld's new book, A Bad Day on the Romney Campaign: An Insider's Account , blames Romney's staff for his defeat.  Romney aides have dismissed the account , saying Schoenfeld was not as high …

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BREAKING - REPORT: DOJ LEAKED DOCS TO SMEAR FAST & FURIOUS WHISTLEBLOWER, SAYS IG  —  The Department of Justice (DOJ) Inspector General published a new report Monday that confirms former U.S. Attorney for Arizona Dennis Burke leaked a document intended to smear Operation Fast and Furious scandal whistleblower John Dodson.

Four key Hillary Clinton staffers from 2008 unlikely to sign on for 2016 bid  —  Howard Wolfson, the 2008 communications director for Hillary Rodham Clinton, has said he will not return for a 2016 presidential campaign.  Neither, for that matter, will Neera Tanden, the campaign's policy director.

How Obama Handles Crisis  —  The handwringers and bed wetters in the D.C. punditocracy should know that Barack Obama will never be on their timeline, says his longtime speechwriter Jon Favreau.  —  Honestly, they act like it's his first crisis.  —  Sometime after the infamous Denver debate last fall …

Lewis Butts busted for campaign sign caper  —  Democratic mayoral hopeful Lewis Butts meets with the PennLive/Patriot-News editorial board on April 12, 2013.  Christine Baker |  cbaker@pennlive.com (Christine Baker)  —  Harrisburg mayoral candidate Lewis L. Butts, Jr. has been charged …

True Scandal  —  Catherine Engelbrecht's tale has all the markings of a classic conspiracy theory: She says she thinks that because of her peaceful political activity, she and her family was targeted for scrutiny by hostile federal agencies.  —  Yet as news emerges that the Internal Revenue Service wielded …

How to Legalize Pot  —  THE first time I talked to Mark Kleiman, a drug policy expert at U.C.L.A., was in 2002, and he explained why legalization of marijuana was a bad idea.  Sure, he said, the government should remove penalties for possession, use and cultivation of small amounts.