This false claim that all the terrorists indicted in the last two years are allegedly motivated by Islamic extremism is not just sloppy. It serves to excuse one of the biggest problems of Rep. Peter King’s fear-mongering: the way it tautologically focuses on Islamic extremism and ignores other terrorists that pose an important threat to this country.

Jared Lee Loughner was arraigned today at the Federal Courthouse in Phoenix, AZ for one count of attempted assassination in the shooting of Representative Gabrielle Giffords, and two counts of attempted murder for shooting two of her staffers, Ron Barber and Pam Simon.

Democrats may be trying to outflank Republicans on health care, but how will the Republicans counteract this? It’s clear they will attempt to take apart the law piece by piece if a full repeal fails as expected. But the six ideas in this Kaiser Health News piece do not include the biggest threat to the coverage expansions in the law, the largely state-based effort to circumvent Medicaid rules.

As soon as I read the news that the new Chinese stealth fighter might have been reverse-engineered from an F-117 Nighthawk shot down during the NATO bombing of Serbia, I wondered the same thing implied (though not explicitly stated) in this Fox News piece: did we bomb the Chinese embassy because they were actively collecting parts and information on the plane?

After winning a series of cases over his residency, Rahm Emanuel has apparently been tossed from the Chicago mayoral ballot by a state apellate court. The case will almost certainly move to the Illinois Supreme Court, which will have the final word.

New York Magazine has a piece that’s attracting a lot of chatter today about Team Obama’s retooling after the midterms. While the media and Village pundits keep churning out lazy “Obama’s moving to the center” stories — here’s the passage that should kill this meme once and for all — but won’t.

If Republicans try to bring repeal to the floor as an amendment to a separate bill – a non-germane amendment, Democrats will try to break it out and force votes on popular elements of the law.

By international standards, our House of Representatives is very small compared to other lower legislative chambers. There is no reason to believe that the House of Representatives would have any problems functioning with, say, 650 members, the size as the UK House of Commons.

The headline “Obama to Press Centrist Agenda in His Address bore very little resemblance to the content therein. Maybe I expected something far worse, and am judging the results thusly, but I’d say that the President calling for new investments and staying silent on the Bowles-Simpson cat food recommendations is pretty darn good, all things considered.

The Israelis look bad on this one for essentially having no interest in the peace process no matter what they could receive from the Palestinians. And the Palestinians look really bad to their hardliners for being willing to give up so much for a homeland.