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U.S. Says Bank of America Needs Cushion of $33.9 Billion – The government has told Bank of America it needs $33.9 billion in capital to withstand any worsening of the economic downturn, according to an executive at the bank.

Engineer distances self from ruined Dallas Cowboys training facility – The engineer listed as responsible for design of the Dallas Cowboys’ now ruined training facility said Tuesday that he had little to do with the project, worked for the builder only briefly and was hired to design small farm buildings.

Obama and Pragmatism: Thinking Through Values – The President seems to me especially thoughtful and passionate about one of the great moral questions of domestic policy today: widening inequality of income and wealth, and therefore of opportunity and political power. As I’ve noted before, as recently as 1980, the richest 1 percent of Americans took home about 9 percent of total national income. But since then, income has concentrated in fewer and fewer hands. By 2007, the richest 1 percent took home 22 percent of total national income.

Most Houston schools touched by swine flu reopen Wednesday – Nearly all the Houston-area districts that had closed schools plan to reopen them Wednesday, allowing parents to return to work and students to resume state testing and final exams.

Inspector at Pentagon Says Report Was Flawed – In a highly unusual reversal, the Defense Department’s inspector general’s office has withdrawn a report it issued in January exonerating a Pentagon public relations program that made extensive use of retired officers who worked as military analysts for television and radio networks.

Obama Takes Aim at Offshore Tax Havens – President Obama will present a set of proposals on Monday aimed at changing international tax policy, calling for the elimination of benefits for companies and wealthy individuals that harbor their cash in offshore accounts.

4th-Grader Questions Rice on Waterboarding – Days after telling students at Stanford University that waterboarding was legal “by definition if it was authorized by the president,” former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice was pressed again on the subject yesterday by a fourth-grader at a Washington school.

Banks Are Prevailing in a Tug of War – Informed debate is a crucial part of public policy development. But the behind-the-scenes tug of war between banks and the government over the results of their recent stress tests strains the already tenuous credibility of the exercise. It also shows that banks have become too powerful.

Is Sestak the Right Choice for the Left? – Progressives are right to want a primary opponent for Arlen Specter — or at least to keep alive the possibility of one. As Chris Bowers notes, Specter has already cast two important votes against his party in his brief tenure as a Democrat, first on mortgage bankruptcy “cramdown” legislation, and then on the budget conference report, where he was joined only by Ben Nelson, Evan Bayh and Robert Byrd joined. Nor has Specter changed his position on the Employee Free Choice Act — a measure which he had supported in past years but revealed in March that he would attempt to filibuster.