UP-FRONT POLITICAL NUGGET!!
The Republican Crack-Up (Matt Miller) from the Washington Post
"Despite Romney’s wins Tuesday, the GOP is cracking up because the party’s most fervent supporters are misguided or clueless about what the country needs to do to solve its biggest problems, and none of the Republican candidates has the wit or courage to tell them. We are watching a party implode at the hands of its base."
'19% of Israelis Support Non-US-Backed Iran Strike' from the Jerusalem Post
"Poll finds vast majority of Israelis against unilateral military strike on Iran, Israeli Jews prefer Obama over all republican rivals."
From Strength to Strength (Rosner and Greenberg) from Foreign Policy Magazine
"Karl Rove and Ed Gillespie have it all wrong. Americans believe in President Barack Obama’s foreign policy competence -- and picking a fight just makes the GOP candidates look lame."
Why Obama’s Re-Election Fortunes Are Suddenly Looking Up (Adam Sorenson) from Time Magazine
"...for this snapshot in time, a weakened Romney and a strengthened economy make for the best outlook Obama’s had in quite some time."
GOP Struggles To Contain Birth Control Fallout from Talking Points Memo
"Top Republicans are working overtime to mask palpable concern within their party over a Thursday Senate vote to roll back an Obama administration rule requiring most employers to provide workers with contraceptive coverage in their health benefits. Yet despite a growing sense that the GOP has veered into politically dangerous territory, a full-scale retreat would embarrass the party, and alienate a powerful segment of its conservative base."
GOP Primary Results: A Suicidal Cage Match (John Avlon) from the Daily Beast
"Romney and Santorum are coming out of Michigan bruised—and detached from reality in the eyes of most voters. John Avlon on why this primary fight is a loss for everyone."
GOP Still Desperate for White Knight Despite Romney’s Michigan, Arizona Wins (Michelle Cottle) from the Daily Beast
"Republicans are less than excited by Mitt’s latest wins and still dream of a candidate who can fire up the base and be mainstream enough to oust Obama. But the likely suspects—Jeb Bush, Mitch Daniels, Paul Ryan, and Chris Christie—have their own baggage."
Odds of a Brokered Convention Are Increasing (Sean Trende ) from Real Clear Politics
"We're finally close enough to Super Tuesday to get a sense of how the overall delegate count might work out in the GOP primary. The end result: Assuming that none of the four candidates drops out of the race, it looks increasingly as if no one will be able to claim a majority of the
delegates."
Romney Pleads For Small Dollar Donors After Primary Wins (Zeke Miller) from BuzzFeed
"First direct appeal at non-fundraising event in recent memory. He's running out of rich people!"
Daily Kos comments on this subject HERE.
Five Lessons Learned from the Republican Presidential Race (Chris Cillizza) from the Washington Post
"Below are the five biggest lessons we’ve learned in the race to date. (And, yes, all lessons learned come in groups of five. It’s just how it works.) 1. Conservatives aren’t picking up what Mitt Romney is putting down. ..."
Extended GOP Race Forces Romney to Search for Funds from the Wall Street Journal
"Mitt Romney is facing a problem he didn't expect to confront at this point in Campaign 2012: Finding enough money to pay for an extended campaign for the Republican presidential nomination."
Cringing With Mitt (Gene Lyons) from the National Memo
"It’s beyond Romney’s powers to persuade most people of his sincerity about things he does believe, much less the many tenets of contemporary GOP faith he probably doesn’t share—assuming for the sake of argument that anybody, including himself, knows which is which."
The GOP’s Ugly Win (Mark McKinnon) from the Daily Beast
"Mitt Romney may have secured the presidential nomination, but his party’s dirty race has done irreparable damage to the Republicans."
Three Percent (Erick Erickson) from Redstate.com
"Seriously, putting it bluntly, conservatives may not like Barack Obama, but most other people do. And when faced with a guy you like and a guy you don’t like who says he can fix an economy that no longer needs fixing, you’re going to go with the guy you like."
Olympia Snowe, Bob Kerrey Shift Senate Landscape (Kyle Trygstad and David M. Drucker) from Roll Call
"When the history books are written, this week may go down as a seminal point in the 2012 battle for control of the Senate. Despite a multitude of vulnerable Democratic-held seats at the start of the cycle, it's increasingly possible that Republicans' inability to stem their own losses could allow Democrats to hold their narrow majority."
Olympia Snowe’s Huge Gift to Democrats (Steve Kornacki) from Salon
"She’s let the Tea Party push her around, but she may have just ruined the GOP’s 2012 Senate hopes."
Olympia Snowe Quit Senate to Protest GOP Agenda (Eleanor Clift) from the Daily Beast
"The Maine moderate’s resignation comes amid a GOP move to push back against what they consider big government trampling on religious freedom, an effort she planned to vote against. But she had long grown ‘sick and tired’ of partisanship, colleagues said."
No Room for GOP Moderates from Roll Call
"With Sen. Olympia Snowe’s startling Tuesday announcement that she would retire, the GOP now must grapple with a key question: Did the centrist Republican lose interest in her Conference or did her Conference lose interest in centrist Republicans?"
Publisher and Author Andrew Breitbart Dead from ABC News
"Andrew Breitbart, the noted conservative Internet publisher and author, has died. He was 43. A statement posted on his website said that Breitbart died "unexpectedly from natural causes" this morning."
Ok ... so what happened? Even up to a couple of weeks ago the world had been hearing from this right-wing loudmouth. This sudden passing combined with the lack of detail on the nature of that passing strikes me as ... odd, perhaps even ... suspicious. What's up?
ANTHROPOLOGY NUGGET!!
New Evidence of End of Neanderthals from United Press International
"European Neanderthals were dying off and already on the verge of extinction even before the arrival of competing modern humans, Swedish researchers say. Scientists said a study of ancient DNA indicates most Neanderthals in Europe died off as early as 50,000 years ago, leaving only a small group that re-colonized central and western Europe and survived for another 10,000 years before modern humans arrived on the scene."
PRE-HISTORIC NUGGET!!
Giant Prehistoric Penguins Revealed from National Geographic
"Big but skinny birds lived on small New Zealand islands 25 million years ago."
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