As scary as CPAC was, keep in mind: it was insufficiently wingnutty for a whole swath of the right-wing movement, as Erick Erickson helpfully reminds us.

Small government activist Grover Norquist is calling for Republicans to begin a serious debate on the Afghanistan war. Not surprisingly, Norquist was focusing on the cost of financing our seemingly endless military commitment to the country.

A poll by the Afghanistan Study Group shows majority of conservatives are turning against the war, prompting Grover Norquist to call for an antiwar coalition. But not everyone is happy about this.

So it appears that the House and Senate will hold votes on extending the tax cuts up to the first $250,000 of income, and letting the rest expire. But they don’t appear to be particularly hopeful that such a plan will actually pass.

This is a really vicious proposal. But just because it has a few tax increases doesn’t necessarily mean that Republicans won’t take it and run with it. And there are enough Democrats in the Third Way side of things to be swayed by a “get serious” approach.

Sundance hit Casino Jack and the United States of Money is everything a documentary should be: Fast paced, informative and fun. It opens with Jack Abramoff’s quote that no one watches documentaries, suggesting that an action film be made instead, and rockets on from there, beginning with a murder and taking us through the perfidious history of Jack Abramoff, a master of corruption, shady deals and deregulation and the fallout: Human trafficking, environmental disasters, the hornswoggling of Indian tribes for casino profits, and murder.

Remarkably, the Audit the Fed movement includes all of the 96 Senators who were present Tuesday.

The Senate just passed the Sanders amendment, Audit the Fed, by a vote of 96-0. Though a weaker version than the Paul-Grayson bill that passed the House, the amendment calls for a thorough audit of the Federal Reserve from December, 2007 until the bill is signed into law. This period covers many of the Fed’s [...]

Good for Ron Paul for telling Rahm and his little pro-bank whip operation to get stuffed. He’s seizing a moment of transpartisan anger at the banks and he’s pointing it straight at the Wall Street apologists. It will be interesting to see how far he can take it.

With no place to go for refuge from corporatist entrenchment, populist opposition from the left and right will continue to have no choice but to work together in order to oppose it. No doubt the demonization for doing so from party loyalists on both sides who don’t want their control of the kleptocracy to be challenged will only get more fierce.