Remember how we’re not allowed to know which companies the AIG bailout money is really going to? Seems Sen. Wyden (D-OR) isn’t happy about it either.

It’s all Limbaugh all the time, with the GOP embracing the talk radio host as the maximum leader and Democrats doing everything they can to encourage that warm hug. That and the day’s other political news in the TPMDC Morning Roundup.

Steele: No one has any idea what I’m doing — and that’s just how I like it!

I’ve been picking up word that Republicans on the Hill genuinely think Norm Coleman is going to get the results of the November elections tossed and have a revote. And if not genuinely, that they’ve all convinced themselves to say they believe it. As I told one friend who passed word on to me about this, the Coleman people must be smoking some powerful weed. Because nothing that has happened in the trial gives the remotest indication that anything like that will happen. Indeed, there’s simply no basis in Minnesota law for throwing out the results of an election. To be clear, I think it’s highly unlikely that the Court will come down with a judgment that will make it possible to Coleman to reclaim his seat. There’s just no indication of that. But while that’s very unlikely, actually throwing out the results entirely isn’t even on the menu of options the judges have before them.

Now, here’s one thing to consider. Are the Republicans trying to lay the groundwork for filibustering any effort to seat Franken, even after the state of Minnesota tells Norm it’s over and he has to go home? Keep an eye out for it.

Whodathunk this Rasmussen poll question would generate 81% “No” answers from Republicans:

Agree or Disagree: ‘Rush Limbaugh is the leader of the Republican Party — he says jump and they say how high.’

Isn’t that about the equivalent of, Are you Rush’s bitch — yes or no?

Reid spokesman on Coleman: “Just because Mr. Coleman is not happy with the results of the election/recount doesn’t mean he gets to schedule another one.”

Over the last week, there’s been a growing realization that President Obama’s budget makes big structural changes to the federal budget and thus to the federal government in general. As the preferred cliches have it, he’s going long or swinging for the fences. And in the last few days we’ve begun to hear not only about Republican opposition, which is expected, but substantial Democratic opposition, or perhaps better to say, resistance. Fourteen Democratic senators (plus Joe Lieberman) met yesterday to discuss their opposition to various parts of the 2010 budget.

In the case of the Stimulus bill, a lot of the objections struck me as pretty weak. That is not to say that there were no grounds for opposition. But the reasons the opposers actually brought forward didn’t really even hold up logically, let alone on policy terms. You don’t think the bill provides enough stimulus, so you cut the parts which provide the most efficient stimulus, and so forth. So my general sense was that the objections were driven more by optics and positioning than specific disagreements on policy.

So we’re digging in on this story to get our best sense of who the opposers are, what’s motivating them, who opposes which provisions and so forth.

This isn’t just any legislative battle. These are big changes and they’ll have profound effects on the country going years and likely decades into the future, especially if they’re perpetrated out through an eight year presidency. So this basic cleavage within the Democratic party, how deep it is, what’s driving it, how imbedded it is, is of the greatest importance. We’re kicking into high gear on the reporting side. But we want your input and insights, and of course your tips if you’re up there on the Hill watching or somewhere else that gives you some angle into what’s happening.

As I mentioned Monday, we’re hearing a lot of banks saying they’ve had it with TARP and they want to give back the money — only to hear oh … maybe they’ll get around to it in ten years or something. But now, courtesy of an article by Daniel Gross in Newsweek, finally we’ve got a bank that’s actually on the level with their gripes.

Give a hand to Iberia Bank of Lafayette, Louisiana. (Maybe Bobby had something to do with it?)

They got $90 million in TARP money in December. A couple weeks ago they decided they didn’t like the scrutiny and interference. So they’re paying it back with interest. And not when they get around to it. They say they’ll have it paid off by the end of March.

I got no beef with that.

Late Update: Damn that Paul Kiel! It seems that on Tuesday the aforesaid TPM alum found that another bank has gone ahead and done the right thing. TCF Financial is giving back its $361 million.