Three dead, boy critically injured and man arrested in shootings at Johnson County Jewish centers  —  Three people were killed and a 14-year-old boy was critically injured Sunday when a gunman opened fire outside the Jewish Community Center and a senior living facility in Johnson County.

State GOP gets to vote on secession at convention  —  To secede or not to secede.  —  That will be the question for Wisconsin Republicans at next month's convention.  —  Earlier this month, the party's Resolutions Committee voted in favor of a proposal that says the state party …

Struggling Dems waiting for Hillary in 2014  —  She's one of the most sought-after surrogates of a party that can use all the help it can get in the midterms.  But for reasons both personal and strategic, Hillary Clinton, potential Democratic 2016 standard-bearer, has largely resisted the tug …

Cynical Race-Baiting Will Fail to Save the Democrats  —  Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader in the House, is guilty of encouraging her members to wage an ugly race war, but it won't work.  —  Sadly, it has come down to this.  When they assumed power in 2009, Democrats promised …

Attkisson: “Chilling effect” from Obama administration on journalists  —  Howard Kurtz interviewed recently-departed CBS News reporter, and asked her why she gave up on a 20-year career at one of the premier broadcast networks.  Attkisson told Kurtz that political considerations were at play …

Three Expensive Milliseconds  —  Four years ago Chris Christie, the governor of New Jersey, abruptly canceled America's biggest and arguably most important infrastructure project, a desperately needed new rail tunnel under the Hudson River.  Count me among those who blame his presidential ambitions …

GOP Deploying Army Of Volunteers To Court Women Voters  —  Signaling that the Republican Party is getting serious about wooing women, the Washington Post reported Monday that the Republican National Committee is planning to recruit an army of volunteers who will court young female voters in Democratic-leaning suburban areas.

Is Obama enforcing the law?  —  Republicans are ratcheting up accusations that President Obama is playing fast and loose with enforcing federal statute.  —  On issues ranging from marijuana legalization and criminal sentencing to healthcare and immigration, the president's lieutenants …

George Bush's Paintings Aren't Funny  —  But they are fascinating.  —  The greatest work of art George W. Bush ever took part in was in 2008, when an Iraqi journalist threw two shoes at his head.  “This is a farewell kiss from the Iraqi people, you dog,” screamed the journalist …

A necessary discussion  —  Mitch Landrieu, the white liberal Democratic mayor of 60- percent-black New Orleans, had this to say about white conservative Rep. Paul Ryan's (R-Wis.) trouble after Ryan spoke out about the “inner city” culture that does not value work:

David Foster Wallace was right: Irony is ruining our culture  —  Percy Shelley famously wrote that “poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world.”  For Shelley, great art had the potential to make a new world through the depth of its vision and the properties of its creation.