GOP RUNNING POLITICAL RISKS with Medicare reforms?

I don’t think so. Moreover, I suspect that the Ryan plan might garner even more support from seniors like me if we were allowed to “buy into” his plan early - maybe as part of a 10-year “grand experiment.”

WHY ‘BIG GREEN’ doesn’t make any sense. Read it all.

ANOTHER USE FOR THE CHEVY VOLT: starting fires.

100 REASONS NOT TO GO TO GRADUATE SCHOOL: “The traditional American master’s degree ... has been dramatically watered down. Will it be long before the PhD suffers the same fate?” It already has.

MORE: Why bother with the expense of a Ph.D. when you can buy one for a thousand bucks?

AND THE DOW JONES INDUSTRIALS LOST 140 POINTS: Standard & Poor’s cut its ratings outlook on the U.S. to negative from stable. Thanks, Mr. President.

NOT AN ENCOURAGING FORECAST: ”Dismal.” It’s becoming more and more obvious that the only solution to America’s problems is the wholesale dismissal of the “elected class.”

TAXES: go where the money is. Willie Sutton supposedly robbed banks for the same reason.

OBAMA SAID that he wants to trim “spending in the tax code” (read as tax breaks) - except for those “tax expenditures” he supports.

STAY TUNED: an email from Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli about Virginia’s lawsuit challenging ObamaCare:

The United States Supreme Court Justices met last Friday to discuss whether or not to grant Virginia's request to expedite our healthcare case directly to the Supreme Court - thereby bypassing the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Virginia, along with many other states and companies, has been left with great uncertainty regarding the healthcare bill. Virginia alone is spending millions of dollars preparing to implement the bill - despite the fact that if Virginia's legal challenge succeeds, the bill may well be stricken before it is ever fully implemented.

The Supreme Court did not make an announcement today on whether or not it was going to expedite the case. Instead, they relisted the case on their docket for this Friday, April 22nd.

What does that mean?

It means that they haven't rejected our request - yet. Remember, requests to expedite are infrequently granted. However, it also probably means that one or more of the Justices want more time to consider the question.

It also means that there appears at least to be interest in the petition at the court, which is itself encouraging. If my numbers are right, over 90% of petitions addressed in these conferences are summarily rejected because no Justice has any interest in them. So, the fact that the Justices didn't summarily dismiss our petition is itself interesting and at least modestly encouraging (hopefully not in the vein of what your mother told you growing up: "the worst thing they can do is ignore you"... of course, my mother has never filed a petition with the Supreme Court).

Generally speaking, we would expect an opinion issued Monday the 25th; however, it is Easter weekend, so I don't know if that will have an impact on timing, but I'll let you know as soon as we find out!

If we’re lucky ....

ANOTHER HIT: Navy Aegis destroyer USS O’Kane successfully engages an intermediate-range ballistic missile [IRBM] during a test off the coast of Hawaii. This a first - using the Aegis BMD system’s launch-on-remote capability. To paraphrase Vice-President Biden, this is a “big deal.”

OBAMA: I WAS AGAINST SIGNING STATEMENTS before I was for them.

USAF SPACE CHIEF eyes simpler satellites. But more 'simple satellites' in low Earth orbit also means more space 'junk' to get rid of.

LEFTISTS IN WISCONSIN acting like drunk frat boys (but without the charm). Watch the videos (if you can stand it).

Commenter Russ G. says it all: “The biggest problem with modern liberalism, I think, is its certainty that it holds a monopoly on truth and virtue. It’s a lot like many forms of Christianity in previous centuries, and like much of Islam today. If you are the one virtuous population in a sea of evil-doers, it is very easy to justify ignoring rules of courtesy. This is evil you are fighting, after all.”

OOPS! CLIMATE CHANGE? Never mind.