As relations between the US and Pakistan continue to deteriorate, it appears that drone strikes have again been put on hold. I can find no reports of any strikes since the March 17 strike on a village jirga killed over forty people. This strike especially infuriated Pakistan, coming just a day after Raymond Davis was released and, despite ample evidence of many civilians being killed, the initial US response was defiant, claiming that only militants were killed and that those killed “weren’t gathering for a bake sale”. Pakistan immediately canceled its participation in the already delayed (due to the Davis case again) trilateral meeting with the US and Afghanistan. I can find no new date yet announced for this meeting. The US military has clearly stated that General David Petraeus has not apologized to Pakistan’s military for the strike and now General James (fun to shoot some people) Mattis is meeting with the head of Pakistan’s army today. This meeting comes amid yet another escalation in the diplomatic break between the two countries, as Dawn reports that a number of US military personnel have been barred from the leaving the country.

Both sides expressed more optimism that a resolution could be reached, but time is short. One sign that a deal may be near is that the House waived its three-day rule for legislation, allowing a deal – or a short stopgap while a deal is being written – to move expeditiously through Congress without a 72-hour delay. This doesn’t mean a deal is going to happen, but it’s the clearest sign that Republicans may actually want one, mindful of what might happen to their favorability in a government shutdown.

Paul Krugman spent Wednesday combing through the details of Tea-GOP genius Paul Ryan’s budget and in a series of blog posts utterly destroyed the Ryan budget’s phony math, implausible assumptions and unicorn forecasts. Kudos to MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow for picking this up.

Krugman once called Ryan a “flim flam” man, a virtual con artist, and yesterday, he proved it. Let us count the ways.

• Anyone think there’s not going to be a shutdown?
• Suck on that, Scott Walker.
• Still waiting for good news from Japan.
• The GOP primary gets even crazier.
• Stay classy, Chris!

No budget deal…but plenty of tears.

The Imperial Rooster — Khorn Sirrup Sundae (KSS). Members of The Imperial Rooster will be joining us in the comments tonight. Please join me in giving them a warm Firedoglake welcome.

Why has Glenn Beck has gotten the shitcan from Fox? Why, I did it. Me! Thers! Me, Thers… and my BFF, Osama bin Laden! Ha ha! You fools! Between us, Thers and my BFF OBL, we run the entire western media-industrial caliphate-complex, and now that our most doughy foe has been deprived of his blackboards, [...]

You can argue whether or not Congress should have warmaking powers over the executive, but you cannot argue about the Constitutional origin, nor can you argue about how Congress has basically left the playing field on war powers for decades now. This is how you have the United States end up in wars that have no end in sight, and then double down and escalate forces in response. Congress could respond by staking out powers for itself, but they have proven to be woefully craven in that respect.

if our government is going to claim that leaks are as urgent as it does, if it’s going to continue to pretend that secrets are, you know, really secret, then it really ought to at least pretend to show urgency on responding to the gaping technical issues that will not only protect against leakers, but also provide better cybersecurity and protect against spies. Aspiring to fix those issues years after the fact really doesn’t cut it.

Today Fox and Glenn Beck’s production company said that Beck, “will be transitioning off his daily Fox News program.”

I’m very happy to hear this (don’t let Bones see me smiling). Beck and Fox are trying to spin this as some kind of “moving on to greater things” action instead of what it is; a big defeat for them and huge win for us. Beck is going off the air at Fox because of a successful, sustained action to convince advertisers that Beck is bad for their brand.