- Michael Tomasky doubts Tea Party candidate Christine O'Donnell’s claim to have the backing of many "Pumas" -- an amorphous group of people said to have gone from die-hard Hillary fans to McCain/Palin supporters during the 2008 presidential election. O’Donnell, the Republican candidate for Delaware’s Senate seat, told Fox News: "I do want to point out that we have broad-based support; we've got a lot of Hillary Democrats working behind us -- with us -- because they're frustrated with what this administration is doing." Tomasky points out, nonetheless, that "O'Donnell is in a statistical tie with the establishment GOP candidate, Mike Castle, who is 71 and has held elective office of one sort or another for four decades. She could win [the primary] tomorrow." Pushed over the line by Pumas and unicorns, of course.
- Thomas Friedman discusses a series of articles about America’s seeming decline from the position of "number one in the world." Basically, maybe it's time we put away the big foam finger.
- Now that Congress is back in session, the DISCLOSE Act may have another chance at becoming law. E.J. Dione notes that the act was just two votes short in the Senate last session. He points out that the "key to its defeat were three Republican senators – Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine, and Scott Brown of Massachusetts — who say they support reform and disclosure in principle but objected to particular aspects of the bill. … [Sen. Charles] Schumer [D-N.Y] has signaled he would be happy to negotiate." Since working with Republicans has been such a breeze lately, this should be no problem, right?
- Remainders: An environmental disaster is sad enough on its own, but when the cleanup involves undocumented workers who get detained rather than paid, it’s an even bigger disgrace; in Italy production of cheap goods by Chinese immigrant workers stokes resentment and fears over devaluing the “Made In Italy” label; income inequality is a fractal; and Arizona violates federal law, again.
-- Peter Bolton
