Mon Feb 9:
http://news.yahoo.com/comics/mattbors;_ylt=Arh.a58cUvLEhXXWaGH2szY0vTYC

Mon Feb 9:
http://news.yahoo.com/edcartoons/tedrall;_ylt=AowHY.ovOK1ALKH6wYQ2kAc0vTYC

For years, Democrats in Congress and open government groups battled, with little success, to expose many of the most closely guarded secrets of President George W. Bush’s time in office.

Now President Barack Obama holds the power to reveal them, but some of his allies may be disappointed when he doesn’t pull back the curtain as far — or as fast — as they would like.

The documents still under wraps stem from the hottest scandals and controversies of the Bush era: warrantless wiretapping, alleged torture of prisoners in the war on terror, the abrupt dismissal of a batch of U.S. attorneys in 2006 and a criminal investigation into the White House’s involvement in the leak of a CIA operative’s identity.

more on Politico

Yes, there will be time to change the politics of Washington and to give people wondrous examples of bipartisanship.

But, no, not now, President Barack Obama made clear at his first White House news conference—not if it gets in the way of passing the stimulus bill on which Obama believes the nation’s economy and his own presidency will hinge.

Urgency was the obvious message Obama was trying to convey to millions of Americans in the hour-long session.

But to a smaller Washington audience—to both Republicans and skeptics in his own party—there seemed to be an equally unmistakable subtext: He is not a patsy or a pushover.

continued on Politico

The Minnesota election contest between Al Franken (D) and Norm Coleman (R) just keeps going on and on. Each candidate wants to introduce hundreds of bits of evidence and scores of witnesses. It is possible that Coleman’s strategy is to wear the judges down and hope they throw up their hands and call for a new election, like in New Hampshire in 1974. No resolution is expected soon.

more on the Votemaster

I’m suspicious that the ‘we don’t nationalise’ mantra is the current equivalent of ‘we don’t torture’…both lies in their own way.

They’ve all but nationalised the banks that were ‘too big to fail’, BUT have NOT written off the bad assets, refuse to make the banks do it, and will, if they proceed down this path, set themselves up for a decade of zombie banks just like Japan did.

Obama is not the messiah, and Geitner is just as capable of being a lacky to Wall Street as Paulson.

Get ready to have the stars removed from your eyes.

Here are some more poll numbers on President Obama and the stimulus, courtesy of a new CNN survey (conducted Feb. 7-8, MOE +/- 3.5%):
– 76% approve of the president’s job
– Obama’s worst numbers seem to come from last week’s Daschle news: 80% say Obama is doing a good job providing leadership for the country; 76% say he’s doing a good job handling foreign policy; 72% say he’s doing a good job handling the economy; 68% say he’s doing a good job handling terrorism; and 61% say he’s doing a good job choosing his cabinet
– 60% approve the job congressional Democrats are performing, versus 44% who say the same of congressional Republicans
– 74% say Obama is doing enough to cooperate with Republicans, while just 39% say the Republicans are doing enough to cooperate with Obama
– 54% support the economic stimulus, versus 45% who oppose it.

Yep, and have a look to see how the Repugs twist the facts.
more on MSNBC