MUSLIMS ARE RIGHT TO BE ANGRY  —  Bill Donohue comments on the killing of 12 people at the Paris office of the newspaper Charlie Hebdo:  —  Killing in response to insult, no matter how gross, must be unequivocally condemned.  That is why what happened in Paris cannot be tolerated.

John Cornyn Steps Up, Says He'll Spare the Whip … WASHINGTON, D.C. — For several years now, the most powerful Texan in Washington has been the Senate's No. 2 Republican, U.S. Sen. John Cornyn.  When Republicans took control of the Senate on Tuesday, he became even more so.

Boehner defends retribution  —  A day after winning his third term as Speaker, John Boehner (R-Ohio) said his conference had begun a “family conversation” about how to respond to the 25 conservatives who revolted and voted against him on the floor.  —  Boehner confirmed that the Rules …

Support builds for medical device tax repeal  —  A bipartisan group of lawmakers predicted Wednesday that the House could repeal ObamaCare's tax on medical device sales by the end of March.  —  Republicans have pushed to roll back the tax for years, and have insisted for months …

It's All Right with Sam  —  Samuel A. Alito Jr. may be the least recognizable of Supreme Court justices.  I doubt if one American in a thousand could pick him out of a lineup.  Those who do know the name, if not the face, of the 64-year-old justice most likely lump him with the other conservatives …

Neil deGrasse Tyson Gets a Late-Night Nat Geo Talk Show  —  Neil deGrasse Tyson is getting his own show.  —  The astrophysicist and TV personality, who fronted Cosmos in 2014, has nabbed a late-night series on National Geographic Channel called Star Talk.  —  “Cosmos allowed us to share …

IMAGE 1 OF 15  —  Menus across the Bay Area were being hastily rewritten Wednesday after a federal judge struck down California's ban on foie gras, allowing restaurants to serve up the delicacy for the first time in two years.  —  U.S. District Judge Stephen Wilson in Los Angeles ruled …

Christie's Re-Election Campaign Gets Subpoena  —  Prosecutors Seek Documents Relating to Meetings Allegedly Canceled With Jersey City's Mayor  —  Federal prosecutors in New Jersey have subpoenaed Gov. Chris Christie's re-election campaign for documents relating to government meetings …

The N.Y.P.D. Protests: An Officer's View  —  ON Sunday, at the funeral of the slain New York City police officer Wenjian Liu, his grieving father described how his son would call him at the end of each day's tour of duty, just to let him know he was O.K.  —  This sort of habit is familiar to many cops.

Story Highlights  —  PRINCETON, N.J. — An average 43% of Americans identified politically as independents in 2014, establishing a new high in Gallup telephone poll trends back to 1988.  In terms of national identification with the two major parties, Democrats continued to hold a modest edge over Republicans, 30% to 26%.

The Dumbest 57 Seconds Ever On TV?  —  Adam Baldwin linked to this MSNBC clip with a succinct tweet “Spot the morons/cowards.”  —  All due respect to Adam, but his understatement is almost a scandal.  We've posted a lot of incredibly stupid sound bites from MSNBC and other places around here …

The Problem With Meaning  —  Not long ago, a friend sent me a speech that the great civic leader John Gardner gave to the Stanford Alumni Association 61 years after he graduated from that college.  The speech is chock-full of practical wisdom.  I especially liked this passage: