POLITICO: Bob Woodward blasts President Obama ‘madness.’

MICHAEL S. GREVE: Triple the Sequester!

DR. BEN CARSON will be speaking at CPAC. “I suspect the MSM will pass on that one.”

“SMART DIPLOMACY” NOT WORKING OUT SO WELL IN PAKISTAN: The Taliban’s New, More Terrifying Cousin: How a virulent Pakistani terrorist group is trying to annihilate an ethnic rival–and why we should be worried.

THIS ISN’T THAT BIG A SURPRISE: Narcissists tend to have bigger signatures, study says.

RANDY BARNETT: The Libertarian Middle Way.

WARNING: Do not install the new Kindle-for-iOS app. It’s got serious problems. “Amazon yesterday updated its Kindle for iOS app, which works across iPhone, iPad and iPod touch, to version 3.6.1. The update was meant to fix a few bugs as well as the registration process. Instead, that update seems to be wreaking havoc on bookworm-style iThing owners who watched as their Amazon digital libraries and saved settings were erased before their eyes.”

WALTER RUSSELL MEAD ON HISPANIC IMMIGRATION’S IMPACT:

Catholic boosters clinging to the hope that Hispanic immigration will save the Church from a demographic train wreck will find some sobering news here. Hispanic immigration has so far kept the Church of Rome from collapsing in the same ignominious way so many mainline Protestant denominations have, but the Church can no longer count on Hispanics to fill its pews. As has already happened to mainline Protestantism, Catholics may find that between conversion to evangelical Protestantism and the rise of “none”-ism, their numbers will be seriously depleted.

But it isn’t just conversion to evangelicalism that weakens the Church’s ties to America’s new immigrants. The American Catholic Church is not what it was. The networks of nuns, brothers, and other religious that met the needs of poor immigrants and helped them adjust to American life have largely disappeared. The Church no longer has these robust networks to help low income Hispanics the way it did past immigrant generations, and these declining numbers reflect that reality.

So much for the religious story painted by the poll. But it also tells us a lot about American society more broadly. For those who worry about immigration’s cultural impact, this survey is one among many pieces of evidence suggesting that Spanish speakers are if anything more open to ‘American’ cultural values and forces than earlier waves of immigrants were. . . .

But the most startling implications of the trends reported by the survey are political. Being religiously observant in any faith correlates strongly with voting Republican; this goes double for evangelical Protestantism. There are exceptions to this trend, of course. Many Black Christians who theologically and culturally fit in the evangelical tradition are reliable Democratic voters. But overall the correlation holds: evangelical Protestants who spend a lot of time in church are among the most reliably Republican voters in the country.

If a lot of Hispanics are picking up their Bibles and heading off to church, this suggests that over time the GOP share of the Hispanic vote will grow. Over the decades, another trend will likely reinforce that one: as immigrant groups become better established in the United States, their economic interests and their issue priorities often change in ways that benefit the GOP.

Read the whole thing.

MEGAN MCARDLE: A Declaration Of Financial Independence.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: The Arcane Rules That Keep Low-Income Kids Out of College. “The communication barriers extend in all directions: The federal and state government bureaucrats little fathom the complexities of low-income students’ home lives. But the students, most of them first-generation college aspirants, often do not understand what a ‘loan’ or ‘interest rate’ means–much less how to make sure they maximize their TOPS and Pell Grant payouts if they qualify for both.”

And many just give up when they see all the forms. Bureaucracy often purports to serve the poor, but the poor deal badly with bureaucracy. Bureaucratic hurdles are much less of a barrier to the well-off and connected.

AT AMAZON, MP3 Deals Galore.

Also, today only: Simmons ProSport 12x50mm Roof-Prism Waterproof/Fogproof Binoculars, $49.99 (66% off).

WHY AREN’T MORE HOMES SELLING? “Tight lending conditions, a shrinking number of distressed homes for sale, and millions of owners with little or no equity in their homes are holding down the supply of homes for sale.”

NEWS FROM THE ENLIGHTENED REGIONS: Kennesaw, Georgia’s 1982 Gun Mandate Still On The Books, Every Home Owns A Gun.

Kennesaw’s 1982 gun mandate was a direct response to a gun -ban- enacted a year earlier in Morton Grove, Illinois. That was later deemed unconstitutional, but Kennesaw’s law is still on the books.

Added Lt. Graydon, “It was not meant to be an enforceable law. The police department has never searched homes to make sure you had a gun. It was meant more or less as a political statement to support citizens’ second amendment rights to own firearms.”

After the law went into effect in 1982, city leaders say they witnessed a 29% drop in crime. Over the last 30 years, the crime rate has remained low with just four gun-related homicides.

“Our crime rate is generally less than half the national average,” added Lt. Graydon.

Compare with Chicago.

HELEN’S PAGE: The place for shameless self-promotion!

NOW WITH SURGING BIPARTISAN MOMENTUM! Bill Moyers endorses my revolving-door-tax idea.

PEJMAN YOUSEFZADEH HAS a law review article on Dick Cheney’s memoirs.

CONN CARROLL: California’s expensive education failure.

“Nothing is more determinative of our future than how we teach our children,” California Gov. Jerry Brown said in his January State of the State address. “If we fail at this, we will sow growing social chaos and inequality that no law can rectify.”

Bad news, governor: California is already failing its children. And it wasn’t always this way.

According to RAND Corp., as late as the 1970s California’s public schools still had an “excellent” reputation. Then, in 1975, Brown (in his first stint as California’s governor) signed the Rodda Act, giving government unions the power to take money directly out of government employees’ paychecks.

The California Teachers Association quickly poured this new revenue stream into an organizing drive, more than doubling the union’s ranks. The Golden State’s politics have never been the same since — nor has the quality of its public schools. Between 2000 and 2010, the CTA spent more than $211 million to influence California voters and elected officials. That is more money than the oil, tobacco and hospital industries combined. . . .

At an average salary of $69,434 per year, a family of two teachers would bring in almost $140,000 in income per year. That is almost triple the state’s $57,000 median family income — and teachers get summers off.

But all of that money for teachers salaries hasn’t helped students in the classroom. By 1992, the first year for which state-by-state comparisons are available, California ranked second to last among states tested (ahead of only Mississippi), in reading proficiency among fourth-graders.

Read the whole thing.

JOHN PODHORETZ: The Hagel Fight: It was about principle, not politics. “The opposition arose spontaneously among thinkers and activists long familiar with Hagel’s views and the stands he took throughout his career. They — we — came to share the common view that he wasn’t fit for this extraordinarily important job. The nomination required us to speak out, no matter how elusive the goal of stopping him. In fact, failing to oppose a nominee who has said what Hagel has said, and who stands for what Hagel stands for, would’ve been an open acknowledgment that his words and his stands were acceptable. They were not. They are not.”

ROLL CALL: Senate’s Democratic Class of ’08 Faces New Challenges: First-term Democratic senators from competitive states are key to party keeping majority. “Once the building blocks to a supermajority, the first-term class of 2008 Democratic senators now finds itself as the cornerstone of a five-seat majority in danger of crumbling. First elected on the same ticket as President Barack Obama, their next fight carries inherent risks and disadvantages. This cycle, there are more than enough seats in play for Senate Democrats to lose the majority. But party aides remain confident in their eight first-term Democrats up for re-election — all of whom won GOP seats six years ago.”

IT’S COME TO THIS: Illinois Can’t Even Afford To Pay Lottery Winners?

MICHAEL WALSH LIKES MY WELCOME WAGON IDEA.

IS THERE ANYTHING IT CAN’T DO? Why Are Teen Pregnancy Rates So Low in North Dakota? Fracking.

JACK LEW, an object lesson in plutocracy.

THE HILL: House expected to pass Senate version of VAWA bill this week. “After a year-long fight over how to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), House Republicans are now prepared to allow a vote this week on the Senate-passed language. . . . House Republicans had proposed their own VAWA reauthorization bill, and seemed prepared to move it this week. But some House aides said they saw the delay in today’s Rules Committee meeting as a sign that Republicans were not able to coalesce around the GOP proposal.”