Daniel Stone

As the White House prepares to introduce its Supreme Court nominee tomorrow, NBC News reports that Obama has chosen Elena Kagan, the current solicitor general.

Since its debut as a ragtag protest group, the Tea Party has cohered into a formidable voice in the GOP primaries. Now, with a slew of statewide ballot measures, the movement is pivoting again—this time into the unglamorous world of knocking on doors and gathering signatures in an effort to shape local policy.

The Gulf of Mexico oil spill is bad, but hey, relax, people, it's not that bad. That's according to a story in The New York Times this morning trying to assess the damage.

Politics is nothing but the art of timing and opportunity. Opponents of drilling are hoping that now, in the wake of a worsening environmental catastrophe, might be their best opening to make a credible and convincing case that the time to shift to renewable energy is now, and there are 200,000 barrels' worth of reasons currently spewing in the Gulf of Mexico.

The White House has gone to extreme lengths over the weekend and today to convey that all the costs associated with the oil clean-up in the Gulf will be fronted by British Petroleum, the company leasing the rig that caused the spill.

J.Scott Applewhite / AP Comedian Jay Leno at the White House correspondents' dinner. For more images, go to NEWSWEEK's Tumblr. Is Washington too chummy with itself?

America's first, and most promising, offshore wind project was finally given the go-ahead this morning by Department of Interior Secretary Ken Salazar. The project includes 130 turbines over 24 square miles off historic Nantucket Sound with a public and private price tag of $1 billion.

From sound policy to gimmicks. The prospect of an energy bill making its way to the floor of the Senate has gone from almost a sure thing to life support over the past two weeks as Democratic leaders have scrambled to fill in their calendar of legislative priorities.

The final vote tally this afternoon was 57 to 41, repudiation not of the Democrats' financial-reform package but of the period of debate that would precede an actual vote.

The politics of health care were easy. You were either for it or against it, and no one questioned the lines of disagreement. Financial reform is harder, and as the vote is called later today, no one knows exactly how things will shake out.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act made the practice of denying coverage for preexisting conditions illegal as soon as the Department of Health and Human Services begins to phase in the law.

State lawmakers have done a lot since President Obama's election to shake off Uncle Sam, passing "sovereignty" resolutions and a record number of laws that specifically defy Congress on issues such as legalized marijuana and health-care reform.

We here at the Gaggle aren't so steeped in politics that we don't take notice of pop culture from time to time. So we took a long look—and you should, too—at this fantastic Earth Day remix from the folks at Repower America paying homage to hip-hop master DJ Biz Markie, featuring a cameo of the man himself. The message? Clean energy now, yo. (Our favorite part comes at 1:08)

It's no secret on Capitol Hill that Democrats are on the defensive heading toward midterm elections that are considered a referendum on their majorities in Congress and their man in the White House.

Will Iceland's eruption contribute to global warming, or cooling? This time, say researchers, neither.

Did Founding Fathers on Currency Get Facelifts?

Is it morally reprehensible to torture and kill animals and document it on video? Maybe so. But that wasn't the issue the Supreme Court was considering in its latest ruling published this morning.

Bill Clinton's advice aside, three of the enduring frontrunners on the White House's shortlist for a Supreme Court nominee are still Elena Kagan, Diane Wood, and Merrick Garland—legal scholars and jurists with their own unique qualifications.

If you ask Bill Clinton what he thinks, President Obama should throw a curveball with his next nominee to the Supreme Court. The qualities he'd like? Someone young, energetic, and someone who's not a jurist.

Yesterday, we took a look at Elena Kagan, currently on the shortlist of shortlisters to replace John Paul Stevens. One potential downside for Kagan, we suggested, is her current job.

It isn't just apathy; some conservatives are opposed to responding out of principle. But the result is just more government spending.

Solicitor General Elena Kagan remains high on the list to replace John Paul Stevens, a White House official admitted earlier in the week. An excellent legal résumé and experience arguing before the Supreme Court qualifies her over other candidates, some of whom have too little bench experience, others with too many declared positions.

The president's annual salary is $400,000 (which was actually raised from half that amount in 2001). So it was all the more surprising this morning when the White House released President Obama's tax return, showing the family made $5.6 million last year.

Just one week after visiting Europe to sign a treaty, it's now official that President Obama will head to Poland on Saturday for the funeral of President Lech Kaczynski and first lady Maria Kaczynska, who were killed in a plane crash a week ago.

En route to her first solo diplomatic mission in Mexico this week, Michelle Obama made a surprise visit today to Port-au-Prince, the Haitian capital, to survey the recovery efforts in the island country hit with a massive 7.0 earthquake in January.

For two days, the Washington press corps has been inundated with news of all the big names in town and the staged photo ops that are customary between visiting leaders and their host.

The White House is eager to tout more than 47 international leaders in Washington this week for the president's summit on nuclear-weapon security. As anybody who works in downtown D.C. can tell you, so many heads of state in town is highly unusual.

After a month of announcing that he "might be" retiring, the liberal stalwart Justice John Paul Stevens made it official this morning. Effective at the end of the Supreme Court's term this summer, Stevens told President Obama in a letter this morning that he would be stepping down, keen to the timing requisite for Obama to appoint another, and ideologically similar, jurist.

After months of highly publicized and well-funded lobby battles over health-care and student-loan reform, it was becoming easy to diagnose money as the leading evil responsible for polarizing American politics.