Eve Conant

This Week in Progressive and Liberal Media: TPM's Zachary Roth has found it entertaining to note how Virginia Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, "uses stock photos to convey the impression of minority support for conservative goals" on the Web site of her new, much-discussed Tea Party–inspired organization, Liberty Central.

Glenn Beck was in the spotlight this week for his failed interview with former Democratic Congressman Eric Massa. But he's also caught the eye, and ire, of progressive Christians angered by his call for believers to break away from any church that preaches "social justice," linking such churches to Communists and Nazis, and holding up cards with a swastika and hammer and sickle to drive home his point.

For its weekend edition, Counterpunch.com highlighted a story called "How an $11 Robbery in Mississippi May End in a Death Sentence: The Terrible Case of Jamie Scott." The writers of the piece, James Ridgeway and Jean Casella, both write for Mother Jones and published the piece for Solitary Watch, a new project in collaboration with Washington and Lee University Law School's V3 clinic, which will focus on the issues surrounding the rise of solitary confinement in U.S. prisons.

William Teach of RightWingNews.com writes: "Yes, the War on Terrorism is real and still matters." He explores the case of Colleen LaRose, a.k.a. "Fatima LaRose" or "Jihad Jane," who has been held in U.S. custody since October and was indicted this week for providing material support to terrorists and plotting to kill a Swedish cartoonist who in 2007 angered Muslims by depicting Muhammad with the body of a dog. "First, this is the type of case that does belong in civilian court, as she is an...

California's Jerry Brown thinks it'll take a former governor to get the downtrodden Golden State back on track.

In a Townhall.com post titled "Tragedy Occurs. Media Rush to Blame Right-Wing" Kevin Glass writes that the stampede to peg the Pentagon shooter as a right-wing extremist is in full swing. He points to an ominous-sounding tweet by conservative blogger Allahpundit: "It begins"—which links to a Christian Science Monitor piece questioning whether right-wing extremism had led John Patrick Bedell to fire on Pentagon police officers, injuring two before being fatally shot himself.

Fox & Friends has decided that since the White House health-care summit takes place during regular working hours that it is basically a soap opera. "We've heard it's going to be theatrical because after all this is a very theatrical White House" said co-anchor Steve Doocy. "Really it's kind of a soap opera isn't it?" It's true that you can usually expect fireworks with that many conflicts of interest and archetypes stuffed into one small room.

It's not often that Media Matters, which follows the conservative media like a hawk, blogging up every untruth or journalistic misstep, is thrilled with something a conservative has written.

President Obama announced today that he is making a full push for health-care and insurance reform, with a plan that attempts to merge Senate and House legislation and rejects Republican calls to scrap previous efforts and start over.

The Conservative Political Action Conference wraps up tomorrow in D.C., and by the time everyone heads home a straw poll will have announced the most popular politicians who spoke here.  "This is an exciting time for conservatives" Rep.

Every movement has its images, and the tea party movement is no exception.  While conservative speakers are making their case in the main ballroom, an exhibition hall downstairs is packed with various groups selling their wares and ideas, no one better than the tea partiers (though the NRA's faux rifle range comes close).Yes, there are one or two fellows walking around in full tea party regalia, but the tea partiers are getting savvier, and are packaging themselves professionally.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty had some advice for conservatives this morning at CPAC. Right now, he told the crowd, Tiger Woods is about to hold his own press conference.

While TV screens have been filled with images of a small plane that flew into an IRS building in Austin, computer screens of antitax crusaders have also been especially active today.

At past CPAC conferences they called it Blogger Row, the long table set up for bloggers covering the event. This year the blogger room, set up with dozens of tables for (the mostly) conservative bloggers covering the Conservative Political Action Committee is bigger than the room for regular media, and is more crowded.

Perhaps it was the early-slated speech, the first campaign-style political speech of the conference, but Rubio's half-hour talk produced at least five standing ovations.

Tea Party Convention? That's old news. The conservative buzz this week is the annual kickoff of CPAC, the 37th annual Conservative Political Action Committee, which will last three days and feature various shrinking violets like keynote speaker Glenn Beck, Florida Senate hopeful Marco Rubio, Newt Gingrich, Rep.

Established gay-rights groups don't always agree with the methods and strategy of newer grassroots activists.

As "don't ask, don't tell" goes under the microscope at the Pentagon, Fox News is leading the charge to get opposing views into the discussion. One Fox News blogger, producer Trish Turner, writes, "Just caught up with Sen John Cornyn, R-TX, a member of the Armed Services Cmte and head of the GOP re-election operation, to ask him about a repeal of 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell'—and he said, 'At a time when we're putting our men and women through long deployments, it's really not a good idea to engage...

Lt. Dan Choi was watching Obama's State of the Union speech on TV from his home in New York City, his emotions a roller coaster. If anyone was anxious about what Obama would say about repealing "don't ask, don't tell," it was Choi, who was discharged from the military earlier this year for being gay.

President Obama tried in the first minutes of his State of the Union Wednesday night to make it clear to everyone that the U.S. has seen tough times, that it has fended off a second Great Depression, and that "one year later the worst of the storm has passed, but the devastation remains." "We can't afford the bipartisanship and pettiness of political infighting now," warned Obama.

That's the question posed by Ed Morrissey on HotAir.com, but a firm answer eludes him. He has actually posted a poll to help figure out what people think, with options ranging from "fully and enthusiastically support it" to "oppose it as a fraud, demand across-the-board freeze and cuts."The jury is still out.

Air America and Camelot snuffed out in the same week!" Mark Krikorian writes in the The National Review's blog The Corner. "So maybe the work does not go on, the cause does not endure, the hope does not live, and the dream really can die."It was supposed to be the progressive and provocative answer to Rush Limbaugh, but instead Air America is declaring bankruptcy and Rush is going strong.

While Democrats are playing the blame game in the aftermath of Martha Coakley's dramatic loss on Tuesday, conservatives are finding every angle to gloat over their victory.Michelle Malkin, in a post titled "The Massachusetts Meltdown" and illustrated with a dramatic picture of a mushroom cloud, joins the gloatfest: "There was more finger-pointing among Bay State and Beltway Democrats than a Three Stooges TV marathon.

Surprisingly, conservative media hasn't been as outspoken as gay-rights supporters as many had expected this first week of the gay marriage trial in San Francisco.

In California's gay-marriage trial, it's the defenders of the status quo who say they are the underdogs.

By a 5–4 vote the U.S. Supreme Court has halted plans to transmit video from the Perry v. Schwarzenegger gay-marriage trial, a crushing blow for the plaintiffs. "Given the powerful evidence against Prop 8 presented in court today, we are not surprised the initiative's defenders sought to keep this trial as private as possible," wrote Chad Griffin, a representative for the American Foundation for Equal Rights working with the plaintiffs, in an immediate statement during court proceedings.

Perhaps some of the most interesting people engaged in the Perry v. Schwarzennger trial this week in California are those who sit quietly in the main courtroom, observing.

After the trial broke up for the day on Tuesday, actor Rob Reiner joined the line to get a spot in the elevator. I asked him if anyone from the movie Milk was here, and he pointed to a stout man also trying to get into the elevator, "That guy right there is the man you really want to talk to," said Reiner. "He worked with Harvey Milk for years trying to challenge federal laws, and here, 32 years later in S.F., that's what we're doing." By the time we reached the lobby, Milk's friend Cleve...

With the two gay couples off the stand for now, attorneys for the plaintiffs in Perry v. Schwarzenegger are turning to experts and historians to dissect the meaning and progress of the institution of marriage.

Gay marriage is on trial, but it seems that parenting and the effect of gay marriage on children was the issue being weighed most heavily in the first day of the Perry v.