Senator Robert Byrd reportedly visited the hospital today. The cause of his visit wouldn't normally be considered alarming, but the man is 91 years old, so any such visit is bound to be seen as news. My reaction to this announcement was to check the West Virginia legal code for their rules of senatorial succession. Thankfully for Democrats, the state has a Democratic governor who has the power to appoint a replacement, should Byrd not complete his term.

West Virginia's governor, should Byrd's seat become empty, would name a successor right away, to avoid a prolonged vacancy. The interim senator, in Byrd's case, would serve until the next election cycle. Byrd just got re-elected in 2008, so he won't be up for re-election until 2014. Any interim senator would have to face the voters in either the 2010 or 2012 election cycle, depending on when the appointment was made. But if Byrd does make it to the 2014 election, he will be a few weeks shy of his 97th birthday on election day.

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The chattering classes inside the Washington Beltway have decided amongst themselves that when all else fails, they can always revert to their "least common denominator" story about President Barack Obama -- that he is in danger of being "overexposed." You don't have to look very far to find this viewpoint on television, in print, or on the radio. It's like talking about the weather, for the political punditocracy. There's only one problem -- there's not a shred of evidence to back up the idea that President Obama using the bully pulpit (as often as he likes) is somehow a bad thing for him. But that doesn't stop it from being talked about endlessly, whenever Obama is in the same Zip code as a news camera.

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How time flies. This column marks its second anniversary today, by the calendar if not the Volume number. For the second straight year, we only produced 47 columns, but by the calendar we've gone two full years and a few odd days. Actually, now that I think of it, more than just a few odd days. Ahem.

For those wishing to see the humble origins of this column, check out Friday Talking Points, Volume 1, from September 14, 2007 (it was called "Memo To Democrats: Talking Points," and then for a while, "Friday Democratic Talking Points," until it finally settled into the FTP format). At the time, President Bush had just addressed the nation on the ongoing wars, and a battle was shaping up in Congress over war funding. Last year's anniversary column, Friday Talking Points, Volume 47 was written in the heat of the general election campaign, and contained advice for how to talk about John McCain.

But enough of this patting ourselves on the back. On with the show!

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Actually, that's a funny title, since a photo just ran of Obama waving a light saber around. Being a fan of funny presidential photos, I have to say this is my favorite so far from President Obama (feel free to suggest captions in the comments).

But, amusing photos aside, President Obama today announced that he was scrapping George W. Bush's idea of putting a radar system and anti-ballistic missiles in Poland and the Czech Republic. This was the direct descendant of Ronald Reagan's "Strategic Defense Initiative," which was more commonly known as "Star Wars." Hence the title, and hence (in conjunction with that photo) the irony.

Scrapping this idea is a smart decision by Obama, because it defuses a major stumbling block to relations with Russia, and because the system was of dubious strategic value to begin with (if it even worked, which has not been definitively proven). Plus, in both Poland and the Czech Republic, the idea wasn't very popular at all. Nor was it popular with NATO. So taking it off the table results in positive diplomatic gains in more than one direction.

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Senator Max Baucus has released (finally!) his Senate committee's healthcare reform bill. This was supposed to be the "bipartisan" bill, but the only way it can truly be referred to as "bipartisan" is in the growing bipartisan distaste for the bill. Which was not the intent. But, while the mainstream media has been borderline obsessive over Baucus and his Gang and his bill, the real question over Baucus' ultimate meaning to the healthcare reform debate is whether he'll be named to the conference committee between House and Senate whose purpose it will be to hash out the final language, and (if so named) what Baucus will do there.

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Allow me to begin by stating a few things. I have not seen many photos of the "9/12" protest which happened in Washington, D.C. this past Saturday. I have not seen the faked photo, either, which was apparently taken a decade ago. I saw a few very short shots of the demonstrators on television, but since I was entertaining guests this weekend, I wasn't following the news as closely as I usually do. So, having said all of that, I am not even going to address the size of the crowd this Saturday, other than to use what others are claiming here as examples. Because I'd like to talk about the politics, in general, of counting crowds in D.C.

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Minnesota's Governor Tim Pawlenty last week joined in the growing chorus in his party singing the praises of nullification. He didn't come right out and use the word, preferring to talk of "state sovereignty" instead, but the concept is the same. This seems to be an emerging theme among the Republican Party as it lurches slowly towards the 2012 presidential campaign. The fact that the issue was largely settled by the Civil War does not seem to faze those wishing to dish up some red meat to GOP voters.

Pawlenty made the news while talking on a conference call sponsored by the Republican Governors' Association last Thursday. Asked by a caller about using the Tenth Amendment to reject any healthcare reform passed in Washington, Pawlenty (from two media reports, one in Politico and one from Minnesota Public Radio) responded with:

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This column (surprisingly, from that title) is devoted almost entirely to President Obama's speech on healthcare reform to a joint session of Congress this week. But before we get to the good and the bad in Obama's speech, we've got to at least mention the Joe Wilson fracas.

The title is actually from the lyrics of a Talking Heads song ("Walk It Down," from the Little Creatures album):

I . . . I . . . I . . . I turn up the radio
Lies, lies and propaganda
I . . . gonna tell you what I need
Life, life, without surrender

It seemed particularly appropriate this week, after a member of Congress audibly called the president a liar ("You lie!") during the president's speech.

But I have to caution you, while I was pleased to see Joe Wilson become a lightning rod for all that is wrong with the lack of decorum in politics today, I have to say that both sides have a point in the whole argument.

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We speak today not of Valerie Plame Wilson's husband Joseph, but instead a different "Joe Wilson" in the world of politics. This particular Joe is a representative from South Carolina. This Joe was rude to the president last night during his speech in the House chamber by yelling out: "You lie!" There were other similar grumblings and outright heckling from the Republican side of the aisle last night, but none of the rest were as loud and clear on the microphones as Wilson. By his volume and clarity, he elected himself poster boy for the disrespect shown by members of Congress for the president. The other voices in the crowd will likely be swept aside, as everyone in the media and in politics focuses on Joe as the designated heckler of the night.

Joe has now become a lightning rod. The House of Representatives is reportedly considering calling for a censure of Joe. But while it would be an entertaining political sideshow, there are two much more concrete consequences of Joe's heckling worth examining, which we'll get to in a bit. If the situation were reversed, of course, Republicans would be calling for the head (or at least the resignation) of any Democrat who showed such disrespect to a Republican president. Thankfully, a few Republican leaders realized very early on that this was a black eye for the party, and were not shy in saying so. Senator John McCain, for instance, did not mince words in talking about Joe's behavior: "totally disrespectful -- no place for it in that setting or any other, and he should apologize immediately." Joe himself even admitted that he apologized only after his own party's leaders told him to do so.

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President Obama's speech to a joint session of Congress on healthcare reform needed to be a game-changer of a speech. That, it seemed, was just about the only thing everyone could agree upon before the speech. Everyone -- even conservatives -- were saying Obama had to either take control of the process or watch it slip away from him. Of course, after the speech, we'll all go right back to disagreeing with each other about whether (or how much) the game was changed, and whether the changes are good things or bad. Such is the nature of politics.

It was a good speech, I have to say, upon my scant minutes of reflection (I'm typing this just after the speech ended, I should add). Obama inserted himself into the fray in a way he has quite simply not done before. One wonders where we would be now if this speech had happened in June, or even July. Obama threw out some new ideas, and gave a much stronger defense for some existing ideas than I've seen anyone yet do. Obama even spoke of the role and size of government, which was also a welcome surprise since Democrats seem to be allergic to defending their position on this issue (to their detriment, in my opinion). And the speech had a rousing finish as well.

But will it change the debate? Even as Obama was speaking, he was actually heckled, although it wasn't clear whether this was from a Republican lawmaker or the gallery above. A clearer contrast could not be made between Obama once again speaking of bipartisanship and respectful debate, and someone shouting what sounded like "Lie!" or "Liar!" at him when he said healthcare reform would not cover illegal immigrants. The grumbling audibly continued while he spoke of not changing the abortion restrictions already in place in the federal budget, and when he moved on to speak of the public option. This heckling during a speech to Congress was the perfect capstone to this summer's town hall screaming matches, in a way. Also telling, the only laugh of the evening was when Obama admitted that "significant details remain to be ironed out."

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