POLITICO Playbook: Fears about Trump out of the cage  —  DRIVING THE DAY  —  Former President DONALD TRUMP's advisers have been agonizing for days over a puzzle no one could solve for five years: How to get him to stay on script in front of rowdy supporters cheering him on.

Trump's baseless election claims march GOP into ‘policy wasteland’  —  Ronald Reagan, the president who reinvigorated the Republican Party, promoted the GOP as the “party of new ideas” on his way to a landslide reelection in 1984.  —  In the post-Donald Trump era, judging by the fare inside …

Cuomo Attacked Over His Plan for Review of Sex Harassment Claims  —  Democratic leaders in Albany questioned the impartiality of Gov. Andrew Cuomo's choice to lead the inquiry, while others called for his immediate resignation.  —  Hours after a second woman came forward to accuse …

CPAC, all-in for Trump, is not what it used to be  —  The Conservative Political Action Committee's annual presidential preference poll over the years was won four times by Mitt Romney, three times by Jack Kemp and once by George W. Bush.  —  None would be welcome at the conference held this week in Orlando, Fla.

4 Minutes With Jill Biden Grieving with the First Family.  —  She died just as I arrived at the wrong hospital.  It was Wednesday afternoon, February 24, and the First Lady, Jill Biden, was making her first official trip outside Washington to tour the labs of the Massey Cancer Center at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond.

Avril Haines Takes Over As Intelligence Chief At ‘A Challenging Time’  —  As the top U.S. intelligence official for just over a month, Avril Haines has an overflowing inbox.  —  A massive computer hack blamed on Russia is still under investigation.  President Biden has raised the possibility …

DOJ charges man who allegedly sprayed chemicals at cops in Capitol riot  —  (CNN)The Justice Department has charged a Texas man who was allegedly caught on video attacking a dozen police officers with a chemical spray during the Capitol insurrection, according to court records.

The Liberal-to-Ultraleft Pipeline: Breaking the Cycle  —  I have been in DSA since the spring of 2016.  Like many, I was tired of feeling politically lonely and isolated.  I saw DSA as one of the only places where I could find others that shared my anger at the state of the world …

Joe Biden won the presidency by making the most of his lucky breaks  —  Review of ‘Lucky: How Joe Biden Barely won the Presidency’ by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes  —  Book critic  —  Sometimes a book is so eager to take readers behind the scenes that it neglects to spend enough time on the scenes themselves.

Senate mulls changes to $1.9 trillion coronavirus bill  —  The $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief plan is facing a potential woodchipper in the Senate as lawmakers consider making changes to the mammoth bill.  —  The House passed the legislation on Friday, sending it to the Senate where it could come up next week.

The Surprising Key to Combatting Vaccine Refusal  —  Why wouldn't someone want a COVID-19 vaccine?  —  Staring at the raw numbers, it doesn't seem like a hard choice.  Thousands of people are dying of COVID-19 every day.  Meanwhile, out of the 75,000 people who received a shot …

MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell Gets MUTED During Live Interview at CPAC as He Spews Vaccine Conspiracy Theories  —  The conservative pro-Trump YouTube channel Right Side Broadcasting Network (RSBN) cut off MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell during an interview at the Conservative Political Action Conference …

‘They Will Break You’: Inside Navalny's Notorious New Prison Home  —  In conversations with The Moscow Times, former inmates of the jail where Navalny will serve his time spoke of psychological isolation and harsh conditions.  —  Russian officials said Sunday that Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny …

I hate to say it, but Britain's doing OK.  Even Germany envies us...  For those of us who like to talk Britain down, all this good news is hard to take.  The vaccination figures are shocking.  Nearly 20 million first doses administered.  A forward-thinking procurement plan.

Jimmy Hoffa FBI files that have been hidden since 1975 must be released, lawmakers tell DOJ  —  Eric Shawn: The move in Congress to declassify the Jimmy Hoffa FBI files  —  What happened to Jimmy Hoffa may soon be known, if the government reveals what it has kept hidden for decades.

Kristi Noem gets standing ovation for Dr. Fauci dig at CPAC  —  Gov. Kristi Noem (R-SD) received a standing ovation from CPAC attendees for her remarks about South Dakota's handling of the coronavirus pandemic.  Dr. Jonathan Reiner criticized Noem's comments, saying that her ‘science denialism’ resulted …