It's Obama, stupid: Carter and Gore to end Clinton bid  —  DEMOCRAT grandees Jimmy Carter and Al Gore are being lined-up to deliver the coup de grâce to Hillary Clinton and end her campaign to become president.  —  Falling poll numbers and a string of high-profile blunders …

‘Bitter’ Is a Hard Pill For Obama to Swallow  —  He Stands by Sentiment as Clinton Pounces  —  Sen. Barack Obama on Saturday expressed regret about the way he phrased a remark describing the plight of Americans who live in small towns, as Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign continued …

Dancing fools  —  I was very sorry to be missing this, as I'm out of DC for the weekend, but not as sorry as I am now—someone just got arrested.  —  The background: twenty people were at the Jefferson Memorial, dancing to the private groove of their own iPods so as not to disturb anyone.

Forget It.  It's Chinatown... Big Lizards Breaking Bombshell News!  —  The most iconic photograph from the riots attending the torch-bearing ceremony, the one that has every tongue wagging, is surely this one: A Tibetan supporter violently assaulting a wheelchair-bound woman carrying the torch through Paris.

Joking students called on the carpet  —  The pair at Colorado College are rebuked over a feminist-newsletter parody seen as threatening.  —  A satirical response to a feminist publication at Colorado College has landed the college and two of its students in the middle of a fierce debate over freedom of speech.

Serious Question  —  The ACLU wants a special prosecutor to investigate Bush's admission that he authorized torture.  I think that is a swell idea that is likely to go nowhere.  —  I hear John Conyers asked an assembled crowd today in Philadelphia whether any of them would object to impeaching the president.

Will Clinton Over-Reach?  —  The “bitter” spat is gold for Morris-Rove politics, which is why Clinton is exploiting it so baldly.  It is exactly the kind of debate that has constructed American politics since Vietnam; it is exactly the kind of politics that Obama has been trying to transcend.

Bill Clinton, China linked via his foundation  —  A firm that has donated to the president's charity is accused of collaborating with the government in its crackdown on Tibetan activists.  Hillary Clinton has spoken out against China's actions.  —  NEW YORK — As Chinese authorities …

Furore over Hitchens's sapphic slip  —  When is a lesbian not a lesbian?  When the person in question is a gay, Catholic, conservative blogger by the name of Andrew Sullivan, it would seem.  —  For when Sullivan was stuck for words on an American news discussion programme last week …

Pirates can claim UK asylum  —  THE Royal Navy, once the scourge of brigands on the high seas, has been told by the Foreign Office not to detain pirates because doing so may breach their human rights.  —  Warships patrolling pirate-infested waters, such as those off Somalia …

OBAMA IN 2004  —  TPM Reader GB sent me in the video of a 2004 appearance by Barack Obama on the Charlie Rose show in which he talks about the same issue of rural and working class Americans and the Democratic party.  It's from November 23rd, 2004, so just after Obama was first elected …