Here is the White House explanation of what many will openly deride as "Government Motors," the bankruptcy solution for General Motors being pushed by the Obama Administration.

As we head into the weekend, the initial debate on Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor has been muted on one hand, aggressive on another and still a bit murky for some Democrats.

The Obama Administration has made clear that it plans to take a legal dispute over the release of detainee abuse photographs to the U.S. Supreme Court if necessary.

So, you want to be on the U.S. Supreme Court, eh? Then here is your weekend homework, a little questionnaire for Judge Sonia Sotomayor. It may take more than a few days to complete.

I get the emails each week. They cite a bill number in Congress and make some ominous accusation about what is contained in the legislation, usually some kind of political conspiracy which is also accompanied by complaints that the press is ignoring the issue.

I guess a lot of politicians and their staffers in DC are on vacation this week, because I thought some headlines in Wednesday's newspapers might have prompted some outrage on the future of GM.

As the Senate starts to get ready for confirmation hearings on President Obama's choice for the U.S. Supreme Court, the best part is how much material is already available for review and being used by both sides.

I got some questions from listeners after talking the other day about how 18% of all Supreme Court nominees have not made it to the bench, so I thought I would take a look at some of that history.

Yesterday I wrote about how the White House had gotten an early edge on Republicans by nominating someone for the U.S. Supreme Court during a Congressional break week.

It's never a good thing for a member of Congress when the words "FBI wiretap" and "Senator" are used in the same sentence. But that's what we have now out of Illinois.

If you are looking for holes in President Obama's choice for the U.S. Supreme Court, then maybe the best example right now is a case involving affirmative action and reverse discrimination that came before appeals court judge Sonia Sotomayor in 2007.

The Tuesday morning announcement of a Supreme Court pick is a reminder of how a White House can drive the news cycle. But it's also a reminder of what the loyal opposition didn't do.

So what happened in 1997 when President Bill Clinton nominated Sonia Sotomayor for a spot on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals? And does it mean a rude reception now for her bid to join the U.S. Supreme Court?

This is one of the "break" weeks that Congress has built into its yearly schedule. If you don't live in the Capitol Hill bubble, it probably doesn't make much sense, but inside, it does.

After plucking one of my kids out of the bathtub on Sunday evening, my blackberry noted the arrival of a message bearing President Obama's schedule for Monday.

The back to back speeches by President Obama and Vice President Cheney were a fascinating thing to watch. It was almost like Campaign 2008 was underway again.

Democrats made it over the first hurdle as they try to push major legislation on greenhouse gas emissions, what's referred to as a cap and trade bill.

Here is the prepared text sent out by the White House of President Obama's speech today on national security issues.

I can't wait to see all the splashy graphics on the cable networks on Thursday as they juggle coverage of speeches by President Obama and former Vice President Cheney.

I have had a front row seat for a lot of debates on a lot of subjects since getting my first job on Capitol Hill in 1980. It has been amazing to see how things have changed on the issue of guns.

If all goes as planned, the House today will accept a credit card reform bill that was approved by the Senate on Tuesday, with a gun rights amendment added last week.

If there is one thing you realize quickly as a reporter covering the Congress, it is that lawmakers tend to make very strong statements about something, and then sometimes you find that they said the exact opposite at some other point in the political discussion.

It didn't really surprise me when I saw the results of a poll on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi from Rasmussen. 43% say the CIA may have misled Pelosi on waterboarding. 41% say they don't think that happened.

The Senate will try to jump start action today on a bipartisan credit card reform bill that President Obama has said he wants on his desk by the end of the week.

The U.S. Senate Finance Committee released the first comprehensive review by the Congress of what Democrats might consider in order to pay for their major efforts at health care reform. In a word, it can be described mostly as "taxes."

As the House Energy and Commerce Committee begins a second day of work on an over 900 page measure on climate change, I wanted to give you a window into the bill and see what you can find in the details.

It was very instructive to see what the response was of the CIA Director to the accusations that the spy agency misled Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Congress about the use of waterboarding on terror detainees.

Whether you refer to it as cap and trade, cap and tax, an energy tax, climate change legislation, etc., Democrats start their effort today to move that measure through the U.S. House.

Congress will try to cram a bunch of stuff in this week, with a scheduled break next week for Memorial Day, but lawmakers may not get done as much as leaders had originally hoped for.

While we wait for the emerging details on what Democrats want to do to reform health care, let's take a look at the overriding goals of each party on this heated political issue.

Let's quit thinking about huge political stories and take a minute to make a pick for Saturday's second leg of horse racing's Triple Crown.

While Democrats haven't settled on one plan for health care reform as yet, an array of details started to bubble up this week about what a health care measure might look like.

It has been an interesting last week or so, watching Democrats squirm more and more on the issue of what to do with terrorism detainees now being held at Guantanamo Bay.

Democrats and Republicans are doing their level best right now to come up with a winning strategy on the health care reform issue.

The House begins work today on a bill that funds extra money for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. As usual though, there's a lot of other things in this bill.

Senators on Tuesday started getting into some of the really difficult issues on health care reform, namely, how to find the hundreds of billions of dollars that backers say it is going to cost.

The news on Tuesday that Florida Governor Charlie Crist had decided to run for the US Senate was welcomed by the GOP Establishment in Washington, D.C.

Two new reports released by the feds on Tuesday only confirmed what we all know here in DC, and that is the financial picture of the U.S. Government isn't very good.

It didn't take long for debate in the U.S. Senate on a credit card reform bill to take a detour, as the issue at hand had nothing to do with credit card interest rate hikes or late fees.

This blog may be entitled "Health Care Momentum," but that isn't my conclusion at all. Rather, that is what the White House wants people to think about the drive for health care reform.

There are more hearings in the Congress on health care reform today, but once again, everyone is just chewing around the edges, because no one has any details on what is going to be proposed by Democrats and the Obama Administration.

Lost in the weeds of news on health care reform Monday was the fact that the White House proposed raising $58 billion more in revenue to help pay for a health system overhaul.

Here is the text of a letter to President Obama from a group of major health care industry players, pledging to reduce health care costs in the future.

After reading through way too many pages of President Obama's budget details over the weekend, I thought I would share a few of the more interesting - and maybe odd things - that I stumbled upon.

As the White House released one photograph from that over $300,000 photo op over New York City involving Air Force One, the official who approved that mission resigned his post.

It was a spicy debate in the House Appropriations Committee on Thursday, as lawmakers approved a war supplemental spending bill for Iraq and Afghanistan. Most of the debate though was on the future of detainees at Guantanamo Bay.

Thursday was all about focus and message at the White House, as officials there kept hammering home their $17 billion in budget cuts laid out for the Congress.

I'm not sure what else I can possibly expect in terms of news anymore about Sen. Arlen Specter and the future of his seat in the Senate.

President Obama's nominee for the job of General Counsel of the Army is in a bit of trouble in the Senate, not for what he put on his resume, but for what he left off of it.

As the House Appropriations Committee goes to work today on extra money for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, one of the toughest battles might not be related to either of those military operations.

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines the word specter as "a visible, disembodied spirit." That almost might have applied to Sen. Arlen Specter on Wednesday.

As the White House rolls out the details of the federal budget for the next fiscal year, we'll see the details of $17 billion in proposed cuts that the Obama Administration has identified.

There is nothing like an "emergency supplemental" spending bill in the Congress to realize what the standard operating procedure is for lawmakers - adding even more money than what the White House has asked for.

Fifteen years after watching the demise of the health care reform effort of President Clinton, I can still remember the crystallizing moment of that debate, when critics started to get the upper hand. It was courtesy of Sen. Arlen Specter.

Congressional Democrats announced yesterday that they had reached a deal on the so-called "Cash for Clunkers" bill, which would offer vouchers of up to $4,500 to entice people to trade in their old cars and to buy new ones.

A key Senate Committee holds more hearings today on what type of changes should be considered when it comes to health care reform legislation.

As both parties and most of my colleagues try to parse the words of President Obama about what he wants in a Supreme Court justice, what about the idea of picking someone who has never been a judge before?

Normally, I don't like to say that certain legislative proposals of a President are "dead on arrival," because sometimes they do have a little bit of life in the Congress, especially a Congress that's controlled by the President's party.

There has been a lot of hand wringing of late from Republicans about how they get their party back in gear and back in the political majority.

What? You didn't see the news? Yep, it's evidently true. Barack Obama has been indicted for treason, by groups of "citizen" grand juries.

We are supposed to finally see the details of the Obama budget this week, a move that's sure to bring out all kinds of emotions among lawmakers in both parties.

All signs this morning are that Justice David Souter will be retiring from the U.S. Supreme Court, giving President Barack Obama a quick chance to nominate someone to the nation's highest court.

Other than playing around with the kids in the back yard this weekend, there is only one place I would rather be, and that's in the stands at Churchill Downs for the Kentucky Derby.

While the White House lost a Senate vote yesterday on the mortgage cramdown issue, backers of a credit card reform bill won an easy victory in the House.

Spring football practice must be just about finished across the country, which means it must be time for the Congress to start yakking about a college football playoff and the Bowl Championship Series.