Report: Shelby Blocks All Obama Nominations In The Senate Over AL Earmarks  —  Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) has put an extraordinary “blanket hold” on at least 70 nominations President Obama has sent to the Senate, according to multiple reports this evening.  The hold means no nominations …

20,000 Jobs Lost in January as Jobless Rate Falls to 9.7%  —  The United States economy shed 20,000 jobs in January, the government said Friday, deepening concern that relief from the deepest economic downturn in a generation would be slow to come.  But even as the economy struggled …

‘Tea Party’ Fireworks: Speaker Rips McCain, Obama, ‘Cult of Multiculturalism’  —  Ex-Rep. Tom Tancredo Suggests ‘Civics, Literacy Test’ Would Have Foiled Obama's Election; High-Priced National ‘Tea Party’ Convention Stirs Debate Among Factions  —  The opening-night speaker …

Franken lays into Ax over health bill  —  Sen. Al Franken ripped into White House senior adviser David Axelrod this week during a tense, closed-door session with Senate Democrats.  —  Five sources who were in the room tell POLITICO that Franken criticized Axelrod for the administration's failure …

Palin Denounces Limbaugh Over ‘Retard’ Cracks, Glenn Beck Next?  —  By Robert Schlesinger, Thomas Jefferson Street blog  —  The collateral damage from Sarah Palin's broadside against Rahm Emanuel for his “retard” comments keeps spreading.  Her spokeswoman today flamed Rush Limbaugh …

The great peasant revolt of 2010  —  “Iam not an ideologue,” protested President Obama at a gathering with Republican House members last week.  Perhaps, but he does have a tenacious commitment to a set of political convictions.  —  Compare his 2010 State of the Union to his first address to Congress a year earlier.

Lobbying Imperils Overhaul of Student Loans  —  WASHINGTON — Four months ago, it appeared all but certain that the White House and Democrats in Congress would succeed in overhauling the student loan business and ending government subsidies to private lenders.

Andrew Sullivan's Heroic Self-Appraisal  —  Is there some world championship for self-deceit and puffery of which I am unaware?  Andrew Sullivan seems to have penned a winning entry.  His theme, roughly - How I Was So Right About Sarah Palin Yet So Wrong About John Edwards. … Any day now!

Queens girl Alexa Gonzalez hauled out of school in handcuffs after getting caught doodling on desk  —  A 12-year-old Queens girl was hauled out of school in handcuffs for an artless offense - doodling her name on her desk in erasable marker, the Daily News has learned.

Fiscal Scare Tactics  —  These days it's hard to pick up a newspaper or turn on a news program without encountering stern warnings about the federal budget deficit.  The deficit threatens economic recovery, we're told; it puts American economic stability at risk; it will undermine our influence in the world.

Minority rules  —  Steve Pearlstein really goes to town on bipartisanship today: … Word.  But I'm a bit less taken with his belief that the “dynamic is unlikely to change until the voters get so disgusted that they are willing to indiscriminately turn out all incumbents, irrespective of party and ideology.”

Struck Down: Feds Refuse to Explain How Agent Injured Daily Caller Writer  —  The State Department has refused to answer basic questions about an accident that took place in Washington on Wednesday night, in which a U.S. Diplomatic Security Service vehicle struck Daily Caller employee Sean Medlock as he was crossing the street.

Socialism Viewed Positively by 36% of Americans  —  Majority of Americans positive on capitalism, entrepreneurs, free enterprise, and small business  —  PRINCETON, NJ — More than one-third of Americans (36%) have a positive image of “socialism,” while 58% have a negative image.

Is Obama a Corpse-man?  —  I don't think President Obama is dead politically, by any means, but corpses seem to be on his mind.  I heard about his mispronounciation of “corpsman” on Hugh Hewitt's show tonight—if you don't listen to it regularly, you should.

New Hampshire independents abandoning Obama in droves: Poll  —  The crucial independent voters of notoriously independent New Hampshire, the ones who were so vital to Barack Obama's 2008 victory there and nationally, are fast falling out of love with the Democrat.