Ray Charles — Hit The Road, Jack, 1996.

You may have noticed that FDL is running a fundraiser. Or you may not have noticed, having only clicked over here accidentally after Googling “Scooter + Naked,” and are wondering who the hell this “Libby” person is when all you wanted to do was indulge your creepy Muppet fetish. In which case, give us fifty bucks or we’ll tell your mom!

Ha ha. That is a joke. More seriously, you may be wondering just exactly why FDL is running a fundraiser. Like all liberal blogs, is not FDL lavishly funded by George Soros (pictured here)? Well, yes. But truth be told, most of that scratch goes for Beagle Chow and to pay off the massive FCC fines resulting from a certain unnamed potty-mouth’s television appearances.

Senator Coburn spent about 20 straight minutes today whining to Elena Kagan about how much less freedom we have today than we did 30 years ago.

Which Amy Klobuchar promptly shredded–by far the highlight of today’s hearing. As she points out, back in Coburn’s idyllic free time, women were not represented on the Supreme Court–and barely were in Congress. (Though, note, she corrected herself later–Senator Kassebaum was serving in the Senate already by 1980.)

But then what would you expect from one of the C Street boys, huh?

The publication of Barry Eisler’s novel “Inside Out” is a big deal, because until now, no one has taken the headlines surrounding the Bush/Cheney/CIA torture scandal and made them the subject of memorable fiction.

Feingold doesn’t mention this directly, but his reputation four months from his re-election matters here. He voted against Riegle-Neal, which consolidated the banking sector. He voted against repealing Glass-Steagall. He voted against TARP repeatedly. He has been a lonely voice for sanity in the financial markets, and he obviously feels that going against that to support a half-measure doesn’t make sense for him, especially not with an election coming in November.

Feingold also charges that Senate Democrats and the White House have “bargained” with him by telling him to accept the bill as it is, not by moving it in his preferred direction. That’s not a bargain at all, that’s an ultimatum.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi has told the Huffington Post she expects a “serious drawdown” of U.S. troops from Afghanistan in the summer of 2011. The House Rules Committee has now approved an amendment for consideration on the war supplemental that will allow Speaker Pelosi to “put her money where her mouth is.”

Okay boys and girls, it’s time for a little more “energy-based geology” courtesy of your Aunt Toby. You didn’t know that I know anything about geology, did you? Well, I had better since I live smack dab in an area which given the amount of natural gas formation there is, has the potential to make the BP oil volcano pollution look like small change.

Seemingly out of nowhere, the Obama Administration has engaged in multiple behind-the-scenes and public efforts on comprehensive immigration reform this week. But it remains to be seen whether this will yield any results.

California state Attorney General and Democratic candidate for governor Jerry Brown has recently displayed a dangerous lack of knowledge about basic economics and the likely effects of marijuana legalization.

Today on a call with reporters and bloggers, Representatives McGovern (D-MA) and Pingree (D-ME) made it crystal clear that not only is the war in Afghanistan not making us safer, it’s truly hampering efforts to get this country back on track.

Repeatedly, Pingree and McGovern related how when it comes to domestic priorities like jobs, unemployment insurance and aid to states, the arguments they’re having with their colleagues in the House of Representatives center on spending, the deficit and the seemingly all-important question, “How are you going to pay for it?” But when it comes to the war, there’s no such debate. As Representative McGovern put it bluntly:

We’re going bankrupt, we can’t extend unemployment insurance, but when it comes to Karzai, we’re a bottomless pit.