It was every businessperson's nightmare. Arriving at Harv's Metro Car Wash in midtown Wednesday afternoon were two dark-suited IRS agents demanding payment of delinquent taxes. "They were deadly serious, very aggressive, very condescending," says Harv's owner, Aaron Zeff.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) -- energized and animated on ABC's "This Week" on Sunday -- announced that the American public was tiring of the "crap" and "spin" offered by the Obama administration in an effort to get health care passed.

The South Carolina Republican appeared shortly after White House senior adviser David Axelrod suggested Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) was being disingenuous for criticizing a health care bill that resembled the one he supported in Massachusetts.

"The interview I just heard is spin," Graham protested. "I thought the campaigning was over. Are you trying to tell me and the American people that Scott Brown, got elected campaigning against a Washington bill that really is just like the Massachusetts bill? The American people are getting tired of this crap. No way in the world is what they did in Massachusetts like what we are about to do in Washington. They didn't cut Medicare when they passed the bill in Massachusetts. They didn't raise $500 billion on the American people when they passed the bill in Massachusetts. To suggest that Scott Brown is basically campaigning against the bill in Washington that is like the one in Massachusetts is complete spin."

Graham went on towhack the White House on a host of other health-care-related fronts. He accused the president of "arrogance" in pushing legislation in a non-bipartisan fashion. And he called the idea of using reconciliation to get a bill passed a "sleazy process" that would "open up Pandora's box."

"If they do this it is going to poison the well for anything else they would like to achieve this year or years after," Graham warned.

On some issues, the South Carolinian is one of the few Republican allies the White House has in the Senate.

If you are reading this on Sunday and haven't set your clock ahead, you're probably late for something. At 1:59 a.m. March 14th, the clocks moved ahead to 3:00 a.m. Daylight savings has arrived, and the phrase, "Spring Ahead" means we lose an hour of time -- poof -- just like that. Those first mornings are brutal, aren't they? Our house is crabby for a week. Makes me wonder what the heck is behind daylight savings anyway. Where did it come from and is it worth the hassle?

Daylight Savings, or Summer Time, as it is called elsewhere, was conceived to make better use of daylight hours, and move an hour of light from the morning to the evening. Some like it, and many don't. According to webexhibits, work productivity decreases as everyone adjusts to the time change. Auto accidents increase and sleep disturbances certainly affect adults as well as children. Heart attacks seem to spike the first week of daylight savings.

Farmers hate it. "The chickens don't adapt to the changing clock until several weeks later," said Canadian poultry producer Marty Notenbomer. Mother Nature and her animals could care less about our human trickery.

Turns out, our very own Benjamin Franklin first conceived the idea of shifting daylight in 1784, but it wasn't enacted into law in the United States until 1918, when the standard time zones were also established. It was then repealed in 1919, with a Congressional override of President Wilson's veto, and control went to individual states. The idea has been filled with controversy, split implementation, and mixed results ever since.

In 1947, writer Robert Davies let his irritation be known with this quote, "I object to being told I am saving daylight when reason tells me I am doing nothing of the kind. I even object to the implication that I am wasting something valuable if I stay in bed after the sun has risen. As a lover of moonlight I resent the bossy insistence of those who want to reduce my time for enjoying it."

In the 1940's-1960's there was so much confusion over which towns were observing daylight savings and when, that the railroad and radio stations could barely function. In 1965 the adjoining towns of Minneapolis and St. Paul couldn't agree on whether to observe Daylight Savings. The result was a one hour time difference within the same local district. Imagine the hassle with that one!

Finally a national standardizing law was finally passed in 1966 with the Uniform Time Act. It was revised in the 70's and again in the 80's. In 2005, the passage of the Energy Policy Act was passed, which extended Daylight Saving Time by four weeks, with the hope that it would save 10,000 barrels of oil each day through reduced use of power by businesses during daylight hours. Unfortunately, it is possible that little or no energy is saved by Daylight Saving Time. We love our air conditioners, and with longer evenings, a cold mint julep just isn't going to cut it.

In 2005, several counties in Indiana observed daylight savings - with the incentive it they would save an estimated $7 million in electricity costs. However, after studies were conducted, it turned out they actually spent $8.6 million more -- most likely due to the increased use of air conditioners later in the day after work. I remember the hot summer months when electrical grids in the East Coast were straining to keep up with the demand, and wonder if daylight savings may have outworn its use.

I had no idea this one little hour lost was filled with so much hassle and so much history. Clearly we are creatures of habit, and the circadian rhythms are flowing in our bodies for good reason. Biological clocks are not meant to be switched at a whim. Even algae has a biological clock, and when researchers at Vanderbilt University disrupted the clock the algae grew much more slowly than normal algae.

So, how do we all adjust to this nuisance and manage to Spring our biological clock ahead? Naps don't seem to help, and it is advised not to look at the clock during the day, but allow your body to naturally adjust to the light change. The best bet is to get out for a run or brisk walk to help kick in some extra serotonin. After a day or two, the routine resumes for most.

What do you think Huff Po readers? Do you love daylight savings or hate it? How do you adjust? Is the change becoming an energy and financial drain on our economy? Love to hear your comments below.

American society appears to be undergoing a crisis in trust. Most of the major organizations that we depend upon, including governments of all types, corporations, our health care system, our financial institutions, and our schools all seem to be failing us. Indeed, I do not believe it is an exaggeration to claim that our society is actually undergoing a disintegration process whereby the fundamental premises and values supporting our institutions are all being called into question. While such disintegration is of course very painful to experience, it is also a tremendous opportunity for genuine transformation. My essay will attempt to outline some of the most important values and strategies necessary for the creation of, and the transformation to, high trust organizations.

Higher Purpose

Virtually all of our societal organizations seem to have either forgotten or have never really known why they exist and what their higher purposes are. Instead, they have often elevated narrow individual and institutional self-interest into the only purposes that they recognize as valid. Our governments all too frequently serve the politicians and the public service unions rather than their citizens. Our schools too often serve their educational bureaucracy and teachers' unions instead of their students and their parents. Our health care system too often seeks to maximize the profits of pharmaceutical companies, hospitals, doctors, and insurance companies rather than the health and wellness of patients. Many of our corporations primarily exist to maximize the compensation of their executives, and secondarily shareholder value, rather than value creation for customers, employees, and other major stakeholders.

The single most important requirement for the creation of higher levels of trust for any organization is to discover or rediscover the higher purpose of the organization. Why does the organization exist? What is it trying to accomplish? What core values will inspire the organization and create greater trust from all of its stakeholders?

While there are potentially as many different purposes as there are organizations, I believe that great organizations have great purposes. The highest ideals that humans aspire to should be the same ideals that our organizations also have as their highest purposes. These include such timeless ideals as:

The Good: Service to others--improving health, education, communication, and the quality of life. Southwest Airlines, Nordstroms, The Container Store, Amazon.com, and Joie de Vivre Hospitality are examples of this great purpose.

The True: Discovery & furthering human knowledge. Google, Intel, Genentech, and Wikipedia all express this higher aspiration.

The Beautiful: Excellence & the creation of beauty. Apple and Berkshire Hathaway share this ideal in their own unique ways.

The Heroic: Courage to do what is right to change & improve the world. Grameen Bank and the Gates Foundation express this higher purpose in their actions.

Organizations that place these higher purposes at the very core of their business model tend to inspire trust from all of their major stakeholders: customers, employees, investors, suppliers, and the larger communities that they exist in. Higher purpose and shared core values tend to unify the organization behind their fulfillment and usually act to pull the overall organization upwards to a higher degree ethical commitment. Higher levels of trust are a natural result of this unity of purpose, shared core values, and greater ethical commitment.

Conscious Leadership -- Walking the Walk

Next to the power of higher purpose, nothing is more important for creating high levels of organizational trust than the quality and commitment of the leadership at all levels of the organization. It doesn't matter if an organization has a higher purpose if the leadership doesn't understand it and seek to serve it. The various stakeholders of an organization, especially employees and customers, look to the leadership to "walk-the-talk"--to serve the purpose and mission of the organization and to lead by example. It is especially important that the CEO and other senior leadership embody the higher purpose of the organization.

As the co-founder and CEO of Whole Foods Market, I'm the most visible person in the company. One of the most important parts of my job is touring our stores and talking to our team members, customers, and suppliers. I know that in virtually everything that I say and do, our team members are always studying me, trying to determine whether they can trust me and the mission of the company. I'm always on stage. So walking the talk is very important. I try to communicate the mission and values of Whole Foods at every opportunity and I try to live those core values myself with complete fidelity. Fidelity to the mission and values builds trust, while any deviance undermines it. High trust organizations and hypocritical leadership are mutually exclusive.

Teams Everywhere

Human beings evolved in relatively small tribal bands. Many scientific studies have indicated that our ability to maintain close trusting relationships with family, friends, and co-workers is constrained to probably not more than about 150 people. We can, of course, know many more people than this, but it is hard to know them well enough to develop close bonds of trust based on actual experiences. At Whole Foods we recognize the importance of smaller tribal groupings to maximize familiarity and trust. We organize our stores and company into a variety of interlocking teams. Most teams have between 6 and 100 team members and the larger teams are subdivided further into a variety of sub-teams. The leaders of each team are also members of the Store Leadership Team and the Store Team Leaders are members of the Regional Leadership Team. This interlocking team structure continues all the way upwards to the Executive Team at the highest level of the company.

It has been our experience at Whole Foods that trust is optimized in this type of smaller team organizational structure. This is because each person is a vital and important member of their teams. The success of the team is dependent upon the invaluable contributions of everyone on the team. Trust is optimized when it flows between all levels within the organization. Many leaders make the mistake of believing that the key to increasing organizational trust is to somehow get the work force to trust the leadership more. While this is obviously very important, it is equally important that the leadership trust the workforce. To receive trust, it is usually necessary that we give trust. Organizing into small interlocking teams helps ensure that trust will flow in all directions within the organization -- upwards, downwards, within the team, and across teams.

Empowerment = Trust

While small teams are essential to optimizing the flow of organizational trust, equally important is the philosophy of empowerment. The effectiveness of teams is tremendously enhanced when they are fully empowered to do their work and to fulfill the organization's mission and values. Empowerment must be much, much more than a mere slogan, however. It should be within the very DNA of the organization. Empowerment unleashes creativity and innovation and rapidly accelerates the evolution of the organization. Empowered organizations have tremendous competitive advantage because they have tapped into levels of energy and commitment which their competitors usually have difficulty matching.

Nothing holds back empowerment more than the leadership philosophy of command and control. Command and control (C&C) is actually the opposite of empowerment and it greatly lessens trust. C&C usually involves detailed rules and bureaucratic structures to enforce the rules. Such detailed rules almost always inhibit innovation and creativity. People get ahead in the organization not through being innovative, but by following the rules and playing it safe. C&C may produce compliance from the workforce, but it seldom unleashes much energy or passion for the purpose of the organization. Empowerment = Trust. C&C = Lack of Trust.

The Importance Of Transparency and Authentic Communication

A very important measurement and condition of trust is transparency. If we want to optimize trust then we must seek to optimize transparency. When we decide to keep something hidden the motivation is almost always a lack of trust. We are afraid that the information that we wish to hide would cause more harm than good if it were widely known. While of course, some discretion is usually necessary to protect important organizational information from migrating to one's competitors or to outsiders who wish to harm the organization, such discretion can easily be overdone. Transparency is a very important supporting value for empowerment. Indeed, it is difficult for an organization to be empowered if it lacks transparency.

Whole Foods Market strives to optimize transparency to all of our stakeholders. Authentic communication with honesty and integrity are essential attributes of both transparency and trust. This is the exact opposite of what many organizations do, which is to try to "spin" their messaging to tell people what they believe people want to hear so that people will think well of them. This lack of honest, authentic communication and transparency usually boomerangs, however, and undermines trust and creates cynicism. One of the main reasons why Americans don't trust many political leaders, including the various Presidents that have led us, is that we discover that they routinely lie to us. They don't tell us the truth and we come to understand that they don't trust us and feel that they need to manipulate us. We tell the truth to people that we trust.

The high-trust organization takes the risk of revealing too much information. We must be willing to take the risk that some valuable information may fall into the wrong hands because our commitment to empowerment and trust necessitates taking that risk. Creating transparency and authentic communication is an ongoing challenge that every organization faces. We must continually strive to remove the barriers that prevent it, knowing that we can't maintain high levels of organizational trust without it.

Fairness in All Things

Nothing unravels trust more quickly in an organization than either the reality or the perception of unfairness. Another important virtue of creating a culture of transparency is that it helps ensure that unfairness is clearly seen and can therefore be corrected quickly. It is essential that the ethic of fairness apply to all key organizational processes such as hiring, promotion, compensation, discipline, and termination. Favoritism and nepotism undermine organizational trust. They cannot be tolerated. People are often prone to envy and any perceived unfairness exacerbates this tendency greatly, giving it the energy of justification.

Creating a Culture of Love and Care

Ultimately we cannot create high trust organizations without creating cultures based on love and care. The people we usually trust the most are the people that we also believe genuinely love and care for us. All too often, love and care are not qualities that we associate with organizations. We tend to look for love and friendship with our families and friends, but not from our work. Why is this? Many people believe that love and care in the organizational setting interfere with efficiency and get in the way of making the "tough but necessary" decisions that the organization requires for success. This type of thinking reflects our own lack of integration of love and care in our own lives. We have created an artificial barrier that is holding back our own personal growth and the full potential of our organizations.
Fear is the opposite of love. When fear predominates in the organization, love and care cannot flourish. The opposite is also true--love and care banish fear. How can we create more love and care in our organizations? To answer this would require another essay and perhaps even an entire book. After discovering the higher organizational purpose, nothing is more important than encouraging and nurturing love and care. Here are a few suggestions that will hopefully stimulate further thinking on this incredibly important goal of creating more love and care in our organizations:

• The leadership must embody genuine love and care. This cannot be faked. If the leadership doesn't express love and care in their actions then love and care will not flourish in the organization. As Gandhi said: "We must be the change that we wish to see in the world."

• We must "give permission" for love and care to be expressed in the organization. Many organizations are afraid of love and care and force them to remain hidden. Love and care will flow naturally when we give them permission and encourage them.

• We should consider the virtues of love and care in all of our leadership promotion decisions. We shouldn't just promote the most competent, but also the most loving and caring. Our organizations need both and we should promote leaders who embody both.

• Cultivate forgiveness rather than judgment and condemnation. Too many organizations believe that judgment of others and criticizing failures are essential for creating excellence. While striving for excellence is important for all organizations, this can be done at a higher level of consciousness without condemnation. Forgiveness doesn't mean condoning mistakes and failures. It simply means that we help the other person to learn from their mistakes through non-judgmental feedback and encouragement.

• End all your organizational meetings with "appreciations". This is something that Whole Foods Market has been doing for about 25 years now with wonderful results for spreading love and care. Give everyone participating in the meeting the opportunity to voluntarily appreciate and thank other members in the group for services they have contributed or qualities that are admired. This one simple cultural practice of appreciating our fellow team members moves us out of judgment and fear into the consciousness of love.

Conclusion

We have the opportunity to create more conscious and higher trust organizations in the 21st century. To do so will require three major changes. First the organization must become conscious of what its higher purposes are. Without consciousness of higher purposes organizations will not reach their fullest potential because the creative energy within the organization will not be fully expressed.
Secondly, we'll need our leaders to evolve to higher levels of consciousness and trust themselves. We will not be able to create high trust organizations without more conscious and high trust leaders. Less conscious leaders will tend to hold their organizations back.

Thirdly, we will need to evolve the cultures of our organization in ways that create processes, strategies, and structures that encourage higher levels of trust. These will necessarily include the important ideals of teams, empowerment, transparency, authentic communication, fairness, love and care.

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report) - Facing a possible Congressional ethics investigation, embattled former Rep. Eric Massa was upbeat today, telling reporters, "I welcome a good probe."

Mr. Massa's remark surprised reporters because the ethics investigation could prove to be thorough, but the former congressman was unruffled: "Let the probing begin, and the deeper better."

"Here's the thing about a probe," he said. "It always feels good in the end." More here.

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion/540777/reclaiming_a_legacy_the_death_of_fatima_meer_and_the_world_cup

I journeyed to South Africa to celebrate the life of the late poet, anti-apartheid fighter, and sports activist Dennis Brutus. During my stay, another giant of the South African freedom struggle passed away: Fatima Meer. Fatima left us at the age of 81 and embodied a tireless grassroots resistance that stretched back to the 1940s. She was best known in the West as the author of Nelson Mandela's first official biography, Higher than Hope (translated into 13 languages.) Others knew her as a renowned academic who had published more than 40 books. In South Africa, she was nothing less than iconic political royalty.

Over the course of decades, Fatima Meer confronted apartheid with storied bravery: holding vigils outside brutal political prisons, organizing marches of Indian and African women in defiance of protest bans; surviving assassination efforts after attempting to rally alongside Steven Biko. The fact that she did this as an Indian Moslem woman was, in South Africa, both unprecedented and highly influential. But unlike so many others, her legacy of resistance didn't screech to a halt following apartheid's fall. Despite remaining a member of Mandela's African National Congress, she continued to fight for racial and economic justice in the new South Africa even when it meant harshly critiquing her dear friend Nelson. She stood steadfastly with the social movements saying, "If democracy has been clearly and resoundingly implemented then the people should be able to stand up for their rights and not allow themselves to be trampled by officials or politicians."

Given her stature, it's not surprising that the African National Congress rushed to claim her legacy, giving Fatima Meer a public, state funeral, which I attended. Winnie Mandela herself was present and spoke about their decades of friendship. (Dennis Brutus, suffice it to say, did not receive a state funeral. As his friend Patrick Bond said to me, "If Dennis had a state funeral he would have gotten up and left.") The ANC's embrace of Fatima in death raised more than a few eyebrows at the service. Many remarked how bizarre it was seeing the very politicians she lambasted, singing her praises and the very police she confronted, carrying her casket. Fatima's ally, Ashwin Desai, said archly, "I love Monty Python movies and therefore I had no problem with the service. Because that's what it was: Monty Python." Another friend whispered to me, "The last time Fatima was near so many police, there was tear gas."

No one from the social movements that Fatima nurtured was given time to speak. Trevor Ngwane from the Anti-Privatization Forum said to me afterward, "We appreciate the state funeral but she was against the state. She was against state policies. She was against state privatizations. Fatima fought in the streets, in the boardrooms, in the newspapers. So it's a bit rich of the ANC to claim her. Yes she was with them for many years but she was with us as well."

There will be more grassroots remembrances of Fatima Meer in the weeks to come. And yet the most powerful potential tribute may be less than 90 days away. Fatima told friends that she was frustrated and furious with the financing of the 2010 World Cup to be held across South Africa. One political colleague of Fatima, Dr. Lubna Nadvi said to me after the funeral, "There is no question: the best tribute to Fatima would be the largest possible march on the World Cup." Given the state attacks on street traders, township dwellers, and students in advance of the tournament, there could be nothing more fitting. Given the fact that the ANC has championed the World Cup, having the memory of Fatima Meer on the other side of the barricades would be a just reclamation of her political identity. That's where her dear friend Dennis Brutus would be. That's where she would be. And that would be the ultimate commemoration of their towering legacies.

[Dave Zirin is the author of the forthcoming "Bad Sports: How Owners are Ruining the Games we Love" (Scribner) Receive his column every week by emailing dave@edgeofsports.com. Contact him at edgeofsports@gmail.com.]

White House Senior Adviser David Axelrod warned on Sunday that health care industry lobbyists were descending on skeptical Democratic lawmakers "like locusts" in an effort to scuttle the final vote on a reform bill.

Appearing on ABC's "This Week," Axelrod rationalized the difficulties of getting a majority vote behind a final health care package by pointing to the pressures these lawmakers face.

"It has been a long and arduous debate," he said. "It is a tough issue for members of congress because there is an enormous lobbying campaign going on, on the other side. Lobbyists from the insurance industry descending on Capital Hill like locusts and trying to pressure people to vote against this bill. There is a lot of pressure on people, but I believe we will be there at the end of the day."

The Obama confidant used the same line during an appearance on CNN's "State of the Union" as well, telling host Candy Crowley that "the lobbyists for the insurance industry have landed on Capitol Hill like locusts, and they are going to be doing everything they can in the next week to try and muscle people into voting."

If, indeed, there was a ramped up lobbying campaign to move lawmakers against the bill, the White House (at least publicly) wasn't fretting its effectiveness. Axelrod, on both shows, predicted that health care reform would ultimately pass. As did White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, who told "Fox News Sunday": "We'll have the votes when the House votes within the next week."

Mr. Jobs, Mr. Schmidt and their companies are now engaged in a gritty battle royale over the future and shape of mobile computing and cellphones, with implications that are reverberating across the digital landscape.

In the last six months, Apple and Google have jousted over acquisitions, patents, directors, advisers and iPhone applications.

Two hundred years of words, I will need to describe the destruction my eyes have seen.

Those are the words Jean-Dany Joachim used to describe a visit to his home country of Haiti after the quake, which looked, as he put it, like a country "with its guts open." Joachim, the "poet populist" of Cambridge, Massachusetts, used his poetic talents to help digest the emotion flooding through him. Here's an excerpt from his poem, "To Hear And To See Are Two Different Things, That's True."

I went and I am back, tande ak we se de
It was like in a dream,
or one of those movies that show the after world.
Two hundred years of words I will need to describe
the desolation my eyes have seen.
Two hundred years of memory to heal the scars
many years of labor,
and many more years of relearning.
I saw Port-au-Prince with its guts open,
its bare bones exposed to nothingness.
I saw tangible fear.
I could feel the anxiety and the anguish of the survivors,
but also I saw life waking up slowly.
That reminded me of ants,
coming out of their holes after a heavy rain.

By the poem's conclusion, Joachim, like the survivors, is waking up. And he finds himself feeling tied to Haiti again.

I woke up at the first cockcrow,
a familiar sound that brought back
memories of my childhood.
It was four o'clock.
The fresh odor of morning caressed my face,
as I unzipped my tent's door and got outside.
There were still plenty of stars in the sky,
and the moon was slowly stepping out.
The sun still had a couple more of hours before making its appearance.
I got ready. I suspected that everybody else was sleeping.
I went for my first walk through the new Port-au-Prince.
Life was waking up slowly.
I became part of it.

Joachim isn't the only Haitian American using poetry to help understand, digest, or just witness the disaster. Three such poets took part in a recent "Poets for Haiti" event at Harvard University to benefit the relief organization "Partners in Health."

A high school student named Fabienne Casseus captured her struggle for understanding in her poem "Reflector." Here's a striking excerpt, in which she personifies Haiti in the form of a woman looking in the mirror:

You hung over, unbalanced
Wrenching your belly for support
Willing yourself to strength
But it was too late for a new beginning
Too soon for redemption
You had made yourself death
Your fingertips retraced everything
As if reassuring their existence.

Marilene Phipps-Kettlewell, born and raised in Port-au-Prince, read from an untitled poem that tied her religious upbringing to the city's (literal) downfall.

I was a child, always gazing at the sky...

Yet, on January 12,
the port au prince sky let go of its Christ,
God the father let go of his son's hands
and let him take the fall.
The roof over all saints who long ago had watched
over my first communion vows at The Sacred Heart
collapsed over the whole city.
The roof over all saints watching over the whole city
collapsed over us all.

Patrick Sylvain, a professor at Brown University, was scheduled to be in Port-au-Prince for a conference during the quake, but bowed out when his wife began experiencing labor pains. She experienced great pain on the day of the disaster, and two days later they lost the baby. One of his cousins was also killed in the quake. His pain drove him to write poetry for the first time in years. He described that need to NPR: "I had to write, because poetry for me is a releasing valve, compiling those fragments of emotions into something that could make sense without theorizing about it, because it's pure emotion."

Here's an excerpt from the poem he wrote, called "Ports of Sorrow,"

Early January afternoon, I stand in my own port of pain
Intertwined with my wife as we moan death-like an incision
To the core. Barbed notes in a soprano's throat.

Port-au-Prince has neither port nor prince,
As tempests incessantly sweep through,
1804's bright filament becomes faint and sad,
Dimming like a dying firefly. Life mocks us
With sadistic laughter. I feel burdened by death,
Losses and corpses swarming in my chest.
I need a stronger port to anchor their souls.

Joachim wrote of his first night sleeping in a tent in Port-au-Prince, "my heart was so close to this earth that trembled." And for some, at least, using poetry to get that close can help.

U.S. regulators will announce a major Internet policy this week to revolutionize how Americans communicate and play, proposing a dramatic increase in broadband speeds that could let people download a high-definition film in minutes instead of hours.

Last week there was increased chatter of a deal being brokered by the White House and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.). In exchange for dropping efforts to try 9/11 plotters in federal court in New York, the South Carolina Republican would help deliver GOP support for closing the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay.

Neither political party has embraced these informal negotiations. But the strength of the opposition was laid out on Sunday, when House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) announced that he wouldn't support appropriating money for closing Gitmo even if a gun was pointed at his head.

"We have a world-class facility at Guantanamo," Boehner said on CNN's "State of the Union." "They keep saying they are going to [close it]. They want $500 million from this Congress to rehabilitate this prison in northwest Illinois. I want to see who the members are who are going to vote for this. I wouldn't vote for this if you put a gun to my head."

Boehner went on to argue that the appropriate avenue for the administration was to hold military tribunals for terrorist suspects "right there at Guantanamo." Anything less, he added, would "increase the threat level here" because if terrorist were brought to a domestic location "their friends may want to come."

It was all a bit hyperbolic. But that's how Republicans (save, perhaps, Graham, who has taken heat from Republicans for his stance) have approached the debate. Civil liberty groups and progressives, for all the passion that they have brought to the idea of holding civilian trials and getting Gitmo closed, have not been backed with much, if any, emotional or political commitment from Congressional Democrats.

As Virginia Thomas tells it in her soft-spoken, Midwestern cadence, the story of her involvement in the "tea party" movement is the tale of an average citizen in action.

"I am an ordinary citizen from Omaha, Neb., who just may have the chance to preserve liberty along with you and other people like you," she said at a recent panel discussion with tea party leaders in Washington. Thomas went on to count herself among those energized into action by President Obama's "hard-left agenda."

But Thomas is no ordinary activist.

Continuing to promote "The Marriage Ref" by simply being Jerry Seinfeld, the comedian joined Seth Meyers last night for the segment "Really!?! With Seth And Jerry." Seinfeld took on the role originated by Amy Poehler as he and Meyers laid into Eric Massa. Asked Seinfeld: "Why do I have the feeling that Massa massages were followed by Massa-bations?"

WATCH:

Last night's Digital Short saw the lead singer of The Strokes, Julian Casablancas, lend a helping to the Lonely Island boys. Using a boombox to change the world, he and Andy Samberg did just that. Impromptu dance parties, spontaneous nursing home orgies -- when it comes to powerfully holding up boomboxes, Lloyd Dobler's got nothing on these guys.

WATCH:

TOKYO — A strong magnitude 6.6 earthquake hit off the eastern coast of Japan on Sunday, rattling buildings across a broad swath of the country, including the crowded capital.

There were no reports of casualties, with only light damage to structures near the epicenter, according to local officials.

The quake hit at 5:08 p.m. and was felt most strongly in central Fukushima prefecture about 130 miles (210 kilometers) northeast of Tokyo, according to the Japan Meteorological Agency.

"It was fairly strong, but didn't knock over anything in the office," said Ken Yoshida, a town official in Naraha, one of the hardest-hit areas. He said an earthen wall in town was partially toppled.

The earthquake was centered about 50 miles (80 kilometers) off the eastern coast at a depth of about 25 miles (40 kilometers), the meteorological agency said.

The government said there was no danger of a tsunami, although slight changes to ocean levels were a possibility in some areas.

It was strong enough to gently sway large buildings in Tokyo and was felt across a broad stretch of Japan's main Honshu and northern Hokkaido islands.

Japan's early warning system predicted the earthquake just before it hit, with public broadcaster NHK interrupting a sumo match to warn residents to take cover.

The country is one of the world's most earthquake-prone countries. In 1995, a magnitude-7.2 quake in the western port city of Kobe killed 6,400 people.