“He and his wife, Karen, have some fruit trees back home. Their family harvested about 600 early peaches and then he and their kids peeled them and made them into jam at their house. They ended up transporting about 40 jars of peach preserves to Iowa.” [Des Moines Register, via TPM/JWMcSame]

“President Barack Obama tapped Sen. Mike Lee’s legal counsel to be the next U.S. attorney for Utah, a move that infuriated Democrats from the state and ended a lengthy political drama over who would claim the high-profile position.” [Salt Lake Tribune, via ThinkProgress]

According to Tacitus, Petronius Arbiter:

…spent his days in sleep, his nights in attending to his official duties or in amusement, that by his dissolute life he had become as famous as other men by a life of energy, and that he was regarded as no ordinary profligate, but as an accomplished voluptuary. His reckless freedom of speech, being regarded as frankness, procured him popularity. Yet during his provincial government, and later when he held the office of consul, he had shown vigor and capacity for affairs. Afterwards returning to his life of vicious indulgence, he became one of the chosen circle of Nero’s intimates, and was looked upon as an absolute authority on questions of taste (elegantiae arbiter) in connection with the science of luxurious living.

The Tom Ford of his day, his was among the more spectacular suicides. As the story has it (and no, I don’t care if it isn’t true), in 65 CE, the emperor dropped by for an evening of gladiator buttsecks during which he noticed the many priceless works of art littering Petronius’s penthouse triplex overlooking east 57th. Having had a day or two to work himself into a state, the emperor sent word that, admiring his subject’s collection, Petronius should do everyone a favor and kill himself leaving everything to said emperor.

Read more »

“With most of the 18.4-cent tax per gallon of gasoline set to expire Sept. 30, renewing the tax could be the next political controversy to spark a brawl in an ever more deeply divided Capitol Hill.” [Politico]

Mitch McConnell, speaking Monday night to CNBC’s Larry Kudlow before heading off with John Boehner for some celebratory hookers & blow:

What we have done, Larry, also is set a new template. In the future, any president, this one or another one, when they request us to raise the debt ceiling it will not be clean anymore. This is just the first step. This, we anticipate, will take us into 2013. Whoever the new president is, is probably going to be asking us to raise the debt ceiling again. Then we will go through the process again and see what we can continue to achieve in connection with these debt ceiling requests of presidents to get our financial house in order.

They’re now three-for-three: extending the Bush tax cuts, exacting a pound of flesh for keeping the government open, and turning a formerly pro forma debt-ceiling vote into an opportunistic crisis. Why on earth wouldn’t they think they can keep their winning streak going?

We’re reminded of another supposedly idealistic Democratic President, faced with fierce Republican opposition, who caved on a key issue early in his term. We forget the circumstances, and cannot find a precise reference online, but we’ve always remembered the quote attributed to a Republican lawmaker about Bill Clinton: “He can be rolled.”

Adventures in TV Land [Jared Bernstein, via Ezra]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WFHJkvEwyhk

…’nuff said.

“Paperwork to form the new committee, the ‘Campaign to Defeat Barrack Obama,’ was filed with the Federal Election Commission on April 5. Ten days later, the PAC’s name was changed to ‘Campaign to Defeat Barack Obama.'” [TPM]

@BarrackObama [FlyingChainSaw]