VICTOR DAVIS HANSON: Two Californias. Now read this.

I think 10 years is a best-case scenario.

OUR ALICE IN WONDERLAND PRESIDENT: Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain. If only we could.

WHAT’S THE BIGGEST THREAT to free speech?

WHERE FREEDOM GOES TO DIE: the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

It should be renamed the Center for Stupidity not in the Public Interest.

I WAS GOING TO COMMENT ON E. J. DIONNE’S LUNACY, but Peter Wehner beat me to it.

What Dionne and those of his ilk fail to realize is that the progressive movement has gone so far to the left that the mainstream ‘independents’ and conservative ‘right-wing extremists’ are essentially the same political distance away.

MUCH OF OBAMA’S AGENDA in hands of courts. Why do I have a bad feeling about this news?

FROM MICHELLE BACHMAN:

What do Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid have in common? As I type this email, they're all trying to push a new back-room tax deal through Congress that will move our country in the wrong direction.

This bill passed the Senate last night and is now moving towards the House and could be voted on as early as today.

You may have seen reports that Tea Party activists are joining together in opposition to this bill. I oppose this deal for a number of reasons, because most importantly, this tax deal does not live up to the constitutional values we share.

First: This bill will not make the current lower tax rates permanent for all Americans.

Second: This bill will add to our already massive deficit.

Third: This bill will re-institute the death tax - charging some Americans with a new tax as high as 35%. The death tax currently stands at zero. Americans already pay taxes on their money once to the government during their lifetime; the government should not take 35% of the estate from their heirs at death.

Another bill making its way through Congress is the 1.1 trillion dollar omnibus spending bill containing 6,600 earmarks. These bills show contempt for you and our efforts to return fiscal sanity to our government.

Remember, the Federal Reserve also announced they are embarking on a policy of Quantitative Easing Part II, which means between Quantitative Easing II, the omnibus spending bill and the tax compromise your Democrat-controlled Congress will spend 4.8 trillion dollars over the next 24 months.

How will we ever dig our way out of this debt?

As Tea Party conservatives, you and I must adhere to our shared conservative values or we risk losing the support and organization we have worked so hard to build. Most of my fellow Tea Party activists oppose this bill because it does not meet the fiscally conservative principles we stand for.

Today, I'm asking you to join me in opposing this legislation.

Many Washington politicians remain deaf to November's election results and have grown more out-of-touch with American public opinion. They are ignoring the will of the people. Americans from coast to coast delivered a resounding victory for a constitutional conservative majority in the House of Representatives on Election Day and polling suggests Americans do not want to see their taxes or the national deficit increased.

But that's exactly what this bill will do if Obama, Pelosi and Reid get their way. They are trying to rush this bill through Congress straight to the President's desk and if we don't act immediately, the consequences for our shared principles could be dire. I'm working with other members and Tea Party activists to stop this tax and deficit increase from becoming law. But, there is extreme pressure from both sides to pass this law. I need to know you stand with me in opposition to this back-room deal.

Oh, they got the message all right. They’re desperate to enact as much of their agenda as possible before they get thrown out and replaced by a new Congress.

VOTE NOW: Should the Senate pass the earmark-laden spending bill?

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA signed an executive order establishing the White House Council for Community Solutions: "The Council will provide advice to the President on the best ways to mobilize citizens, nonprofits, businesses and government to work more effectively together to solve specific community needs."

How about just getting out of the way and leaving us alone?

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR JOHN MCCAIN, we’d be preparing for nuclear war - and they were right.