Today's "summit" between the House and Senate leaders and President Obama looks a little like Bristol Palin pretending to be a dancer on TV. Everyone shuffles around, but it doesn't look pretty or feel quite right. Everyone has a favorite and everyone's rooting for theirs to win.

After the summit, the first couple stepped up: Mitch McConnell and John Boehner. They mentioned bifurcation as a compromise on the vote. Looked pretty, sounded good, but they knew they had Dave Camp on the judges panel waiting to shoot it down.

On the other side, President Obama stepped up with an optimists' view and sunny outlook, claiming that these summits would continue, that people wanted them to work together, and naming his priorities. Extending middle class tax cuts, ratifying the START treaty, and extending unemployment were on his to-do list. Applause all around.

And now the voting begins. Here's what's on the table with a 12/24 deadline looming large:

• Unemployment extensions: Democrats want a year-long extension. Republicans want no extension.
• Extension of Bush tax cuts: Democrats want middle class tax cuts and the stimulus tax cuts extended. Republicans want all tax cuts extended for all income levels. Wild card: BlueDog Democrats
• START Treaty: As amazed as I am to even include this in the list, here it is. It must be approved by 2/3rds of the Senate before the end of the 111th Congress or the entire committee process begins again in the next session, meaning it could be delayed as much as another year, for nothing more than political grandstanding.
• Medicare "Doc Fix": This delays the cut to doctors' reimbursements for 20% as it has each year. Note: It looks like this has now been pushed into the next session of Congress, since the president signed a 30-day extension today.
• Defense Appropriations Bill, which currently includes DADT repeal and DREAM Act: DADT is the sticking point, of course, despite today's report from the military affirming minimal disruption if it's repealed. The only leverage the administration has on DADT repeal beyond the principle of the thing are pending court challenges, which they've kept alive in order to have that leverage. If it is not repealed in this session, it creates a policy mess for this administration and those who come behind it.

Those are the bargaining chips. How do they fall, in light of this appearance of bipartisanship which isn't really that at all? Assume the Republicans will not give an inch on tax cuts. Assume they're willing to allow unemployment extensions to expire. They should feel some duty toward our military and national security, so I imagine START and appropriations will be on the table.

Will they trade a one-year extension of the full tax cut package for a one-year extension of unemployment insurance? Will the DREAM Act survive or be sacrificed for DADT repeal? It really comes down to this: No side will get everything they want. All sides may get something they want. What do we want most?

How would you put all this together and get it done before December 24th?

It's very sad and all...I suppose...to see two young lovers torn asunder. So, leaving aside the weepy and over-told tale of Bristol Palin and Levi Johnston one is left to wonder: What's it like in that strange household? Is Sarah Palin able to use her questionable political skillset to better effect in her personal life?

One certainly hopes. And one hopes that they are--all of them--happy, healthy, and not to be heard from on the national stage for a long time to come. And while it's hard to be 100 percent sure, I'm pretty sure this is about how it's going down just outside Wasilla.

Happy Mother's Day!!

The Mahablog: More infantilism

Zaius Nation: Bristol Palin has miraculously transformed herself into the Abstinence Fairy

Alternate Brain: Always remember this...

Informed Comment: Karzai complains about US air strikes

HOLY CRAP: Teacher broke law by calling creationism "superstitious nonsense"...By their fruits ye shall know them...And maybe not want to hang with them...Hypocrites...Nigerian Witch-Finder going to court...Mormon Controversy...Texas seceeding from earth...This Week In God...Religion cures everything... Bible In a Minute...40 million Nonbelievers in America...This time, the Baptists are right...Always good for a laugh...

Yes, that is a tattoo of Bristol's name on Baby Daddy Levi Johnston's ring finger. Anyone else picturing Todd Palin brandishing a shotgun at the tattoo parlor? And just because this campaign can't get surreal enough, from TPM:

(Given) what we've seen so far, I can't say I'd be surprised if the moral jalopy that is the McCain-Palin Straight Talk Express sunk us even further into farce with something like this. From the Times of London ...

In an election campaign notable for its surprises, Sarah Palin, the Republican vice- presidential candidate, may be about to spring a new one -- the wedding of her pregnant teenage daughter to her ice-hockey-playing fiancé before the November 4 election.

Inside John McCain's campaign the expectation is growing that there will be a popularity boosting pre-election wedding in Alaska between Bristol Palin, 17, and Levi Johnston, 18, her schoolmate and father of her baby. "It would be fantastic," said a McCain insider.

If this actually sways a single voter, I weep for my country.

a Chair at my law school, or else
Corporate Crime Reporter

In the last two years, despite a host of financial-irregularity cases, no major public corporation – with the exception of Riggs Bank for Bank Secrecy Act violations – appears to have been indicted for involvement in accounting or financial fraud.

The reason: the federal government's new policy is to permit the corporation to enter into a deferred prosecution agreement.

And according to Columbia University Law Professor John Coffee, the increased use of deferred prosecutions in recent years has led to a shift of power to the prosecutors.

“The deeper problem lies in the danger that power corrupts and that prosecutors are starting to possess something close to absolute power,” Coffee warns in a recent article in the National Law Journal.

According to Coffee, the high-water mark for deferred prosecution agreements: the agreement with Bristol Myers Squibb.

The company was charged with “channel stuffing” and other accounting irregularities.

The U.S. Attorney for New Jersey, Christopher Christie, met with the Bristol Myers board and negotiated a deal whereby the company would contribute $300 million to a shareholder compensation fund, separate the positions of the CEO and chairman of the board, nominate an additional outside director acceptable to the
In addition, the company agreed to endow a chair in business ethics at Seton Hall University School of Law – the law school where U.S. Attorney Christie received his law degree.

Coffee says that the Bristol Myers Squibb settlement raises an issue of “prosecutorial accountability.”

“Should a U.S. attorney exploit his leverage over a corporate defendant to compel it to do good deeds, such as creating a chair at the U.S. attorney's law school?” Coffee asks.  for the full story

Call Me When He Turns Into a Bat            Ezra Klein

You gotta feel bad for Bob Novak. It's no easy transition to start the day a hack and end the week a criminal. That Novakula reacted to Carville's gentle patter as if someone had thrown open his coffin lid in broad daylight is just a symptom -- he didn't expect to be here, didn't want to be here, he's not the story.

But he is.  More... U.S. Attorney, and appoint a special monitor to report to the U.S. Attorney.

In addition, the company agreed to endow a chair in business ethics at Seton Hall University School of Law – the law school where U.S. Attorney Christie received his law degree.

Coffee says that the Bristol Myers Squibb settlement raises an issue of “prosecutorial accountability.”

“Should a U.S. attorney exploit his leverage over a corporate defendant to compel it to do good deeds, such as creating a chair at the U.S. attorney's law school?” Coffee asks. for the full story