Tonight the second set of four Sweet Sixteen games will be played. Yesterday, I correctly picked Kentucky and West Virginia to beat the spread, pushed with Xavier (+5) in a 2OT loss to K-State and missed the Butler upset of Syracuse.

Tonight is Big Ten night, as 3 Big Ten teams play. As for betting propositions, I like Tennessee (+5) over Ohio State, Baylor (-5) over St. Mary's, Mich St (-1) over N. Iowa and Purdue (+9) over Duke.

This is an Open Thread.

Now that the health care bill is passed, what does it do?

• Here's are the immediate benefits
• Here's how it impacts the insurance marketplace

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

March Madness resumes tonight with the first four of the Sweet Sixteen games. the other four are tomorrow night.

My picks: Syracuse (-7) over Butler, West Virginia (-4) over Washington, Xavier (+5) over K-State, and in the ultimate of David v. Goliath games, Kentucky (-9) over Cinderella Cornell (this line looks ridiculously short. Kentucky should be at least a 12 point fav in this game. Trap line? We'll find out.)

This is an Open Thread.

Busy. Open Thread.

Still busy. So is Jeralyn apparently.

More Open Thread.

Busy today. More from me tonight. Not sure about Jeralyn's schedule.

This is an Open Thread.

One last thing - Kevin Drum is right that the health bill's most progressive element is the income distribution implicit in it. The permanence of this distribution is arguable though, and I will argue about it tonight.

I'm glad to see news unrelated to health care today. The media was getting awfully one-dimensional.

Tonight the top 11 on American Idol sing Billboard's top songs. Can't wait to see Crystal, hope she has a good night. Casey too.

We're in the midst of a whopper of snow storm. It began with thundersnow around 3 pm and will continue until tomorrow.

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

Your turn.

This is an Open Thread.

A new season of Dancing With the Stars begins tonight. An odd assortment of "celebrities" -- seems really a "B list" this year. I wish they gave the co-host job to Melissa instead of Brooke. "24" is also on.

"Nurse Jackie" is back with its second season tonight on Showtime. Edie Falco (formerly of the Sopranos)is just great, as is the whole show.

10 states are going to sue to prevent implementation of the Health Care bill. Colorado will be one of them, according to our ultra-conservative Attorney General. Their primary objection (ostensibly): the provision requiring people to buy insurance: [More...]

Did you catch the end of the Michigan State-Maryland game yesterday? Unbelievable. I now predict a Kentucky (original pick) - Syracuse (new pick to replace bounced Kansas) final with Kentucky (original pick) winning it all.

This is an Open Thread.

The House is debating the health care bill. If you're a rules buff, you can follow along on the House twitter feed, where you'll see lots of references to things being "laid on the table," which always reminds me of Cream and "Badge":

Thinkin' 'bout the times you drove in my car.

Thinkin' that I might have drove you too far.

And I'm thinkin' 'bout the love that you laid on my table.

I wonder if anyone in the House has a kid who is married to Mabel. On a more substantive note, FDL is live-blogging the debate.

Update: There's a deal with Stupak. He'll hold a press conference at 4pm ET and announce he's voting for the bill. C-Span will stream live. Republicans on Twitter sound pissed, they're calling him a traitor.

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

Exciting day yesterday. Bad day for me as my Gators lost in 2OT and my bracket lay in ruins at the end of the day.

We strive forward anyway. My picks today's day games - Siena, Mizzou, Texas A&M, Pitt, Xavier, Temple and Wisconsin. Those are my win picks. As betting propositions, I have different selections but that is too complicated to describe here.

This is an Open Thread.