According to a new poll conducted by CNN and the “opinion research” firm ORC International, a majority of Americans believe Barack Obama should nominate a judge to replace the recently deceased Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia.

A conservative amendment inserted into the Affordable Care Act by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) inadvertently gave GOP staffers the ability to get abortions covered by their health insurance. (Assume good intentions dead)

Chuck Grassley, the Iowa Republican, is one of the Senate's most tech-savvy members. He's been on Twitter since 2007, connecting with constituents and sharing his thoughts on a variety of important issues. Here are some of his most powerful tweets from the past year.

Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley is an incredulous old coot who likes to tweet unreadable shorthand nonsense, constantly, and then lash out at those who would make fun of him. Whenever the federal government gets around to killing off the dumb Internet once and for all, they should leave Grassley's Twitter page up as a memorial to fun times lost. Here's a useful perspective for considering how unorthodox Grassley's feed is: When hackers broke into it today, their tweets were instantly more professional than the graffiti that one of our most senior Senators usually vomits out from his phone.

Iowa's curmudgeonly senior senator, Chuck Grassley, is easily the funniest senator on Twitter. And in this new "youth-targeted" reelection ad, the old grump promises to tweet more often, for the people, until he finally keels over.

None of the agency's 28 known masturbators have been fired for looking at kiddie porn on the job, says the SEC's inspector general. But don't worry, Senator Chuck Grassley cares all of a sudden and is looking into it. [WP]

Did pornography cause the recession? According to the AP, the answer is: Probably! Over the last five years, the SEC has conducted 33 separate probes into "employees looking at explicit images"—explicit porno images. Let the "SEC/SEX" jokes begin!

Good news! A Republican helped move a crucial component of financial regulatory reform through a procedural hurdle today, which marks the first time a Republican has helped a Democrat since, oh, the Civil War. But there's bad news too, right?

Director Baz Luhrmann turns 47 today. Gossip Girl's Matthew Settle is turning 40. Joe Bastianich, the restaurateur and partner of Mario Batali, is 41. Russian supermodel Eugenia Volodina is 25. Supreme Court Justice David Souter turns 70. American Idol contestant-turned-Broadway star Constantine Maroulis is turning 34. One of the Miller sisters, Princess Marie-Chantal, is 41. Rapper Doug E. Fresh is turning 43. Lakers head coach Phil Jackson is 64. Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley turns 76. And Paula Jones is 43, although she probably shouldn't expect a birthday card from Bill Clinton.

For the love of God when will public figures on Twitter learn to proofread their tweets, especially those on record as stating that life in the "ghetto" is a direct result of a failure to master the English language?

Last Wednesday a man named Gerald Walpin, a U.S. inspector general investigating the possible misuse of Americorps funds, received a call from the White House informing him of his firing, a firing some believe was politically motivated and highly illegal.

Barack Obama used his weekly YouTube address to announce his intention to address health-care reform in the coming months, an announcement that incited Republican Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa to make a Herculean ass of himself by raging incoherently on Twitter.

• The epic fallout from AIG's decision to pay out bonuses enters a second day: Andrew Cuomo says he plans to subpoena company execs, the Obama administration is scrambling to cool emotions, but clearly his influence is limited. Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa has suggested that AIG execs follow a "Japanese model" and choose between "apology or suicide." [NYT, ABC, WSJ]
• Given the new restrictions on Wall Street bonuses, banks are now looking for loopholes and planning to boost base salaries to offset lower bonuses. [WSJ]
• Goldman Sachs is bailing out its own employees: It's offering to lend money to more than 1,000 employees who've been squeezed by the crisis. [NYT]
• Mortgage fraud is at an all-time high, but you probably figured that. [CNN]
• Unsurprisingly, banks are raising interest rates and cutting credit lines. [BN]
• Housing starts surged in February from a record low the month before. [BN]