I might as well just stop blogging now.

John Scalzi nails modern conservatism in a nutshell.  In a single sentence, so precisely that I am in awe. The rest of the article is a hoot on its own, but this particular portion is just flat out brilliant.

This morning, Vice President Biden, OMB director Peter Orszag and newly minted oversight tough guy Earl Delaney met with President Obama’s cabinet in the Roosevelt Room at the White House to go over the ground rules for increasing transparency for stimulus initiatives.

What follows is a transcript of their remarks this morning — thought folks would want a peek at this:

Earlier this month, we flagged Mark Gitenstein’s rumored contention for the Office of Legal Plans at DOJ as problematic.  At the time, what I was hearing in Beltway grapevine was that Gitenstein was said to be a shoe-in for the job because of close ties to Vice President Biden, a long record of great civil rights work, and his time on the Obama campaign. All that was swell, but it was his close ties to anti-individuals legal lobbying that was so troubling.

President Obama laid out the pragmatic need for health care reform in last night’s speech: “This is a cost that now causes a bankruptcy in America every 30 seconds. By the end of the year, it could cause 1.5 million Americans to lose their homes,” Obama said…

Hilda Solis was confirmed this afternoon as the new Labor Secretary in a vote of 80 to 17. This is excellent news. Mike Hall at AFL-CIO has details: Says [AFL-CIO President] Sweeney: She understands that the Employee Free Choice Act is critical to rebuilding our economy because working men and women deserve the freedom to choose whether to form a union without employer interference.

As Steve Benen points out, the GOP’s strategy of “no cooperation and we win” isn’t exactly a winning strategy.  And yet, here we are. Quite the stage for tonight’s Obama address to Congress, isn’t it? No pressure.

Throughout the history of civilization, profound questions have tested scholars, philosophers and citizens through the ages. None more perplexing than this: where is that next exact moment where wingnut heads explode? They are volatile little people.  It could be anything, really, that sends them, once again, down the shrieking path. Let’s go to the transcript from yesterday’s press briefing at the Obama White House to peek at a strong contender

This was an awfully interesting back and forth from yesterday’s White House press briefing, to which I want to refer in an upcoming post.

But I wanted to give you a read in its entirety simply because so many places in this briefing transcript Press Secretary Robert Gibbs is asked about several issues we’ve all been discussing of late.

I give you the urgent education action news of the day — the re-name “no child left behind” braintrust: Education Secretary Arne Duncan agrees. “Let’s rebrand it,” he said in an interview. “Give it a new name.” And before Mr. Duncan has had time to float a single name, scores of educators, policy wonks and assorted rabble-rousers have rushed in with an outpouring of proposals.

Go figure.

The GOP is marketing retro.  Again.  Color me shocked.  Tim Pawlenty has strategery for the GOP: dress up old, tired hackery in shiny accessories