Sunday morning roundup

I know it's been said before, but Parker and Rich say it so well it would be a travesty not to post their articles. Here's an excerpt from the latter:

...[T]he Sotomayor show was still rich in historical significance. Someday we may regard it as we do those final, frozen tableaus of Pompeii. It offered a vivid snapshot of what Washington looked like when clueless ancien-régime conservatives were feebly clinging to their last levers of power, blissfully oblivious to the new America that was crashing down on their heads and reducing their antics to a sideshow as ridiculous as it was obsolescent.

Maureen Dowd is worth a read, too.