Electronic Pen

Robert Scheer A president has only so much capital to expend, and Barack Obama is dangerously overdrawn.

• Katrina vanden Heuvel: Obama Shows His Progressive Spine
• Leslie Savan: Take the Obama Conspiracy-Theory Challenge

Tess Elliott Though Ken Salazar has vowed to clean up the mess at the Interior Department, his selection for director of the National Park Service, Jon Jarvis, only compounds it.

Dave Zirin & Sherry Wolf The salacious sports media and the puritanical zealots that run international track and field have joined forces to hit a new low.

John Nichols Things have not gone well this past year, despite what Barack "reluctant shareholder" Obama wants to suggest with an anniversary-marking visit to Wall Street.

Gary Younge It takes considerable skill to convince people that something that is clearly good for them--like universal healthcare--is not.

• Leslie Savan: Take the Obama Conspiracy-Theory Challenge
• Chris Hayes: Joe Wilson, You Lie!

John Nichols It is not just Hamid Karzai's dissembling of democracy, it is the whole machinery of the occupation that makes this puppet president so unsettling.